If you were none of these
by fasterassembly
Summary: The TV world infects victims with a virus that turns them into demons who must eat humans to survive. There's only one rule in the television: devour or die. Warning for disturbing content and imagery, including cannibalism. Mostly cannibalism.
1. july(the innocent remix)

Her big brother has been buying a lot of red meat. He stays up all night to eat it, and throw it up later. Nanako knows because her room is next to the bathroom and the stairs, and no matter how quiet he tries to be, the floor squeaks when he passes by her room.

She's afraid of him. He's always nice to her, but when he thinks she's not looking, his face changes from calm to wide-eyed and angry, as though he's thinking hard about something so hard he can't stand it. It's because he eats too much. Nanako knows if he didn't eat all that beef and pork, he'd feel better. So one day when he's out fishing, she takes the meat and throws it in the trash. She goes to bed earlier than usual, but can't go to sleep. He'll understand, she tells herself, because that's what he always does. They're family.

Nanako rests with her head facing the door. It's hot. It'll be summer vacation soon. The sheets wrap around her, the air is too thick, but she won't turn on the A/C. She wants to hear him coming. Besides: it'll be bad for the environment.

She hears the front door unlock. Her brother and Dad sound different coming home. Dad comes home in his car and opens the door too loudly but goes up the steps quietly, so he won't wake her up. Souji comes home either on foot or on his bike, and moves carefully, slowly. He's normally back by ten o'clock, but when he's late, he's even later than Dad. He smells funny sometimes, like the cleaning chemicals in the bathroom she's not allowed to touch. He tells her it's because he's a janitor at the hospital. She breathes in and smells the sharp, chlorine scent. He goes to the bathroom. The toilet flushes. He goes back downstairs. So it's going to be one of those nights. She watches the door of her bedroom. He must be in the kitchen now, opening the fridge and freezer, looking for his meat. She never hears or smells him cooking, but he has to. Otherwise he'd be eating it raw.

Seconds pass. She listens. He should be coming up to bed. That's how this is supposed to go: he's supposed to see the empty fridge and give up, come back upstairs and go to sleep. But then she hears the door open again. He's stepped out.

She slips out of her room. The lights are off. Something moves in the kitchen counter, a severed arm, and she gasps—but it's just some fish on the counter, wet and bloody. There's one big one on top, its eye catching the moon and its face hanging open. She turns away.

The front door is open. She steps out, careful to not make noise. Souji's looking at the compostable trash. He's smiling at it, but in a funny kind of way—almost like he's smiling at her, thinking of something fond. Then he reaches into the compost bin, picks up a slab of meat, and brings it to his mouth.

His hair looks almost white under the streetlight. Juice dribbles down his chin. This is a dream. She doesn't think raw meat can taste this good, but he eats it so fast Nanako wonders if maybe it does. Then he reaches in and eats more. It's like he can't stop being hungry. Nanako thinks this is a joke, the way the boys in school will drop their pants and run around the school, but he keeps going. He isn't laughing.

Nanako goes back up to her room, crawls into bed, and pretends to go to sleep. She doesn't know if she wants breakfast tomorrow. 

* * *

Her Dad is a police officer. He stops bad people from doing bad things, and if they've already done bad things, then he puts them in jail. He smokes and drinks coffee because he's a real detective. He has a gun Nanako's not allowed to touch. Right now he's always busy because of all the things happening in town. A boy in her class was sent to live with his grandmother. Nanako doesn't even know if she has grandparents, if they're still alive.

Her Dad's the best, even if he's never home enough.

Her teacher says they all have to be careful. Don't let in strangers. Watch out! Some people might carry knives. A boy in the fifth grade says the killer is a cannibal. Nanako doesn't know what it means, but the teacher gets mad and spends a long time talking with the boy. No one else in her class knows what it is, either. She's going to go home and ask her big brother what it is. She repeats it in her head so she doesn't forget. Cannibal. Can-ni-bal.

While she's repeating it to herself, the teacher's let the fifth grader go. As he passes her, he bares his teeth and makes claws with his hands.

Her brother's taking exams in school right now.

(Cannibal.)

She's going to give him the paper armband she made in art class if he does well. 

* * *

Dad buys takeout and puts it in the fridge so Souji won't have to spend time cooking food during his midterms week. Dad calls home right before dinner to tell her she can just heat dinner tonight. He won't have time to come home, because he needs to finish the last few forms on the Kujikawa case. She's lucky to be alive, he says, with the injuries she has. But she's holding up remarkably well. Maybe, he says, when he thinks she's not listening, too well.

The fish Souji brought home the night before are gone. She thinks he's fed them to the cats, but the cats aren't crowded by the garage like they normally are when he feeds them. Souji calls home and says he'll be back for dinner to study and keep her company. He's too tired to go to work.

He really does look tired when he comes home. He's brought Yosuke back, too. It's always fun when Yosuke's here. Chie and Yukiko come by later, along with a new boy. Nanako has seen Chie playing with her brother, and she knows Yukiko is an Amagi and will own the Inn. They both look tired. Chie's eyes are watery, like she's been crying often. It must be the midterms.

The new boy is Kanji Tatsumi. He's big, and he looks angry at everything. But he's shy. He mumbles something at her, about how it's nice she's so normal and kind. When she says he's nice, too, he blushes and pats her on the head. Then he puts his fist in his mouth and excuses himself.

Nanako tries to make them go outside and play with each other, but they tell her to sit in front of the TV while they study. She doesn't want them to study, but she's a little relieved. She doesn't want them to watch her. 

* * *

For dinner, they join her by the TV. Souji sits next to her, Yosuke across from her. Yosuke eats a lot—good, she thinks, because he's so skinny. His jeans look like they're about to fall off of him. The things they talk about are weird. They only talk about meat. Kanji says the food's pretty good, but not very filling.

"I know," Souji says. He shrugs, and helps himself to some fried pork. "It helps."

"Not as good as…" Kanji trails off. He looks to Chie, who's been pushing the vegetables in her bowl around for a while.

"I think it's good," Nanako says.

"I do, too," Yosuke says. "Tastes great."

"Well," Souji says, and he smiles as he says this, "you do eat a lot at Junes."

Yukiko reaches over and adds some beef to Chie's plate. Chie shakes her head. "You have to eat something," Yukiko says, and Chie says, "I know, but…"

They're fighting, Nanako knows. She feels her stomach get tight.

"Why aren't you eating anything?" Nanako says.

"I am," Chie says.

"It'll be hard to fight if you're hungry," Souji says. It sounds calm, but he's getting involved now, too. "Come on."

Chie frowns at everyone. She hunches in, picks the bowl up, and picks the meat out of it. She opens her mouth. Then she eats. Everyone is watching. Nanako thinks Chie growls, a little, because she's so nervous. When she finishes, everyone else looks down at their bowls.

"God," Yosuke says. "This tofu's great. And I don't even like tofu." He looks up. He looks puzzled. He looks over to Chie, Then: "This again?"

"Shut up, Yosuke." She helps herself to more rice. 

* * *

Nanako insists on doing the dishes. Kanji and Yukiko help clean up, too. Souji and Yosuke are talking with Chie on the couch. Every now and then, Nanako catches snippets of conversation. She doesn't feel bad about spying on them because Yukiko sometimes turns her head so her ear's facing the living room, too.

They're talking about steak. Or Yosuke's talking about steak.

"It's not like steak at all," Chie says.

"Come on! How is it any different from eating a damn cow!" Yosuke says, loud enough that Nanako can't pretend she didn't hear it.

"How is school, Nanako-chan?" Yukiko says, before Nanako can say anything.

"What are you all fighting about?" Nanako says. She won't back down. Kanji looks flustered. He dries a bowl so hard it squeaks.

Yukiko bites the inside of her cheek. Then she says, "Sometimes, when you start getting in trouble, you have to do things to… get out of trouble. And sometimes those things get you in more trouble."

"What kinds of things?" says Nanako.

At this, Yukiko goes quiet. Kanji moves onto drying another dish. Souji, in the living room, says, "You did it for Yukiko-san. Now you have to do it for yourself, too."

"What kind of things?" Nanako says again.

"I don't know," Yukiko says. "A lot of things, I suppose."

Yukiko is pretty, but she isn't very nice. Nanako isn't sure if she likes her much anymore.

"What is," Nanako starts, and then stops.

"Hmm?" Yukiko says.

Nanako lies and says she forgot.

"Oh," says Yukiko. "That's too bad." 

* * *

Her brother and his friends go to Junes for dessert without taking her. They say they need to run an errand together, and they'll be back soon. Souji tells her to not watch the news. Nanako wants to watch a game show, but her favorite one isn't on. She does her homework instead. Five times five is twenty-five. Five times six is thirty. Car, cactus, chair. The cactus is the one that doesn't belong.

She opens the fridge. There's new meat in there. She throws it out again.

Souji comes back home alone with a small cake. He sets it on the kitchen counter first, though, and sniffs the air. Then he says, "Did you throw out the meat again?"

"No," Nanako says.

Souji gets on his knees and goes through the trash. He removes the slabs of meat from the compost heap. He sighs, and lets it fall back in.

"Don't do that anymore," he says. "I wanted to eat it."

"You eat too much meat."

"I cook for people at school." He washes his hands before he brings her the cake. Nanako sets the table for them. "Do you like chocolate?"

"I love chocolate," she says, because she does love chocolate, and it's just like her big brother to remember what she likes. He cuts the cake and gives her the bigger slice. He eats some of the cake, too, even though Nanako says it's not fair, because he went to Junes without her, so he shouldn't get any cake. He agrees, and puts both pieces in front of her; but she shouldn't be selfish. She eases the plate back to him. She won't be able to finish it all.

He divides the cake into thirds with his spoon, and eats. Nanako does, too. It's an ice cream cake. She gasps in surprise, and Souji smiles when she thanks him. It's nice having a big brother.

After the cake, he looks over her homework. Car, cactus, chair. Cat, chimney, chutes. Cabbage, cassette, cannibal.

Souji pauses, the tip of his pencil leaving a little mark on the worksheet.

"No," he says. "That word's 'cabinet.'"

"What's a cannibal?" Nanako says.

Souji puts his arm around her shoulder. She knows he won't lie to her.

"A cannibal is a bad person," he says. "A very bad person."

"What do they do?" Nanako says.

His grip on her shoulder gets tighter. "They're humans who eat other humans."

"Why?" she says.

"I don't know. Maybe they have to." He lets go of her and goes back to checking her worksheets. His brow is furrowed. He rests his cheek on his fist.

"Is the killer a cannibal?"

"I don't know," he says. "Dojima-san seems to think so."

"What if a dog ate the bodies?"

Souji shrugs. She can tell he doesn't like talking about this. She remembers hearing some of his classmates were killed.

"What do you think, big bro?"

"What do I think? I think the killer didn't want to do it. I can't believe anyone would want to do this to another person. To treat them like they're just… Your Dad will catch them for sure." When he says this, he licks his lips, like he's hungry. He rubs his hand over his mouth. He pats her head, like Kanji did.

"I want more cake," she says, knowing he won't say no. He gets up and gets it for her. Nanako feels a sick, slimy feeling in her stomach. She hugs her knees to her body. She thinks he's lying to her. She thinks he's in trouble.


	2. july(the other castle remix)

Yukiko wakes up hungry, as usual.

It isn't like the craving for toast and butter in the morning she used to have when she dieted, but a devouring, murderous hunger. She stays curled up in her bed for a few minutes, fighting the urge to bite into her own arm, or to chew off her tongue.

She barely sleeps more than a few hours at a time now, unless she's so tired that she collapses for ten or twenty hours straight. And then she wakes up with blood in her mouth, because it turns out that she's bitten into her thumb and sucked the blood off of it. But now her mouth is clean. Tastes sour and dry. Yosuke says that he bites down on his socks at night, and as for everyone else, it's a mystery. Yukiko doesn't like to talk about it. She finds it a little vulgar.

She gets out of her futon, folds it, sets everything as it should be. Before she leaves her room, she tunes into the local radio station. Investigation on mysterious Inaba disappearances continue. Daichi Gouda-san from Okina City was last seen six days ago in Okina City, thought to have fallen victim. His family implores for anyone with information to step forward. Expert in the Inaba case, Naoto Shirogane, says that it's likely that Daichi Gouda-san fell victim to the murderers, yes, murderers. It's unlikely that any single person could pull this off—

Daichi Gouda-san. Yukiko remembers him. He was stringy.

* * *

"Yo, Yukiko-san," Yosuke says. He meets up with her on the way to school. His bike's rusting on the handles and spokes. His shirt hangs off of his body now. He looks at her in a way that makes Yukiko want to hit him, just to be on the safe side. She doesn't.

"Yosuke-kun," Yukiko says. She looks down the path, hoping to see Chie, but she's not in sight.

"Chie's at the shopping district," Yosuke says. "You know that Souzai Daigaku will throw out whole sausages?"

"Oh?"

"She's sneaking some over to Kujikawa-san. You know. So they don't get too suspicious when Rise-chan keeps asking for meat."

Yukiko wants some. It'd be nice.

They eat once a week, enough to live off of, but not enough to ever feel full. It's harder when they go into the TV, especially when they're trying to rescue people from whatever virus had gotten them. Last time had been worse than usual; Kujikawa and Teddie had turned, and had to be suppressed in kind. They had only survived because Kujikawa so generously offered herself up to them so they could keep fighting.

Poor girl. It'll be hard for her to continue her modeling career. Not that the world has much use for cannibals.

"How is she?" Yukiko says.

"Great. Fine," Yosuke says. He walks his bike so they're going at the same pace. "They're letting her out today. Only problem is Shirogane asking all those questions. Wonder if we can eat him, huh?"

"Yosuke-kun," she says. She's not sure if Shirogane would be good. He looks skinny.

"I know, I know," Yosuke says. He frowns. "Geeze. I was just joking."

Yukiko isn't so sure. But he's her friend, and… well, that girl who just walked by looked tempting. Yukiko didn't get a glimpse at the girl's face, and the girl wears her hair straight down, plain. Good. Yukiko doesn't like knowing the names of her food. She imagines tapping the girl's shoulder, and then knocking her down and dragging her off somewhere, stripping off the girl's uniform and then taking a bite of her…

She stops when she realizes that Yosuke's looking at the girl in the same way she is. She tries to focus on the boy running ahead of them, but something about him doesn't look as tasty. She puts a hand over her mouth. The exams haven't made it any easier to keep her energy up. And it's so hard to focus on the question when Ms. Sofue's skirt reveals that much leg. Yukiko can practically smell Ms. Sofue's skin, perfumed and sometimes strangely chalky. Sitting in the front row means that there are a lot of hazards. Not for her. They're hazards for her teachers.

"Partner says that he's already picked the next person," Yosuke says, when there's no one around them. "He wants us to meet after exams at Junes."

"All right," Yukiko says.

A girl bikes by. Yukiko swallows. This is the strange thing about her new condition: how it's brought all kinds of things to the surface, and only certain things excite her.

* * *

Chie does smell a little like sausages when she comes in. Yukiko smiles at her, and wonders if anyone else can smell it, or if it's just her.

"Sorry I couldn't walk with you," Chie says, before the first exam starts. "Yosuke told you, right?"

"Yes," Yukiko says. "Does Kujikawa-san look well?"

"I think she's fine," Chie says, a little distracted. She touches the collar of Yukiko's uniform. "Did you—"

"I thought I washed it out." Yukiko frowns, and gives it a little sniff. No, she did wash it out. Chie must be a little hungrier than usual.

"They're letting her out today—Yosuke told you, right? They're going to, I don't know, draw some more blood—something like that." Chie touches Yukiko's neck again. "Are you wearing perfume?"

"I don't know," Yukiko says. She tugs the collar down a bit. They have this conversation almost every other day, now. She flushes when she sees Chie's eyes, fixed on her neck. She goes even redder when she sees the quiet girl who sits in the back staring at them, a funny, confused look on her face. Yukiko smooths her uniform down. "No."

Chie makes a small, disappointed noise in the back of her throat. Then she says, "Are you—are you on your period, or—"

"Chie!" She's so red now that she's not sure why she even bothers speaking. "That—I—"

"I know," Chie says. "The words just came out—don't be mad, I didn't mean…" Chie tilts her head down, rests her forehead on her fingers. Yosuke's talking with Souji, making wild gestures and talking a mile a minute. Then she looks back up and says, "You smell nice today. That's all."

"Yes," Yukiko says. "Yes. Thank you."

It'd be nice if she could tear off Chie's mouth—she thinks this, and shudders. She wants the exams to start.

* * *

_Devour!_

The word shows up halfway through the test.

She wishes that it hadn't. It looks like a command.

They're going to go hunting tonight.

She shivers.

There's going to be a fog.

Her pencil skips. It's getting hard to think.

* * *

Chie and Yosuke never got along before the incident, and they don't really get along well now, either. They fight a lot. Yukiko thinks that it'd be charming, in another life. Right now they're arguing about the exams at the bike rack. Chie says that it's Yosuke's own fault for his bad grades.

"Well, what's the point in studying?" Yosuke says. He tugs at the chain. It seems to have slipped.

"Don't say that," Chie says.

"Come on, Chie," Yosuke says. "You think we're going to have a future outside when we're like this?" He kicks his bike. "Damn it! Why does this shit happen to us?"

"Don't—"

"Oh, like you give a shit about my bike!" Yosuke snaps. "What does it matter, anyway?" He gives the bicycle another kick, and then his shoe lace gets caught in the spokes and he falls into the bike rack in a tumble. The students around them laugh, almost in relief, and then stop when Yosuke looks up at them, his teeth bared. Later, some students will swear that his eyes were almost glowing.

* * *

"They don't know," Yosuke says on their way to Junes, "how lucky they are."

He's walking his bike to their meeting place. Yukiko and Chie walk beside him.

"I mean," Yosuke says, "I could kill them if I wanted to."

He rubs his nose with the back of his finger, almost sheepishly.

"Whatever, Yosuke," Chie says.

"I could," Yosuke says, but quietly and with great embarrassment. Yukiko looks down at her nails, and wishes that she had painted them a color other than red.

* * *

Kanji is already there with Souji. Kujikawa is there, too. She looks all right, for a girl missing a few feet of intestines and a good deal of other things. Yukiko's a little jealous. At least Kujikawa will have a good excuse for not eating much normal food.

Kujikawa waves at all of them. Souji looks strangely grateful; the reason for that is evident enough as Kujikawa runs her hand along a water bottle with an obscenity that Yukiko has only recently come to recognize in things.

"Exams went all right?" Souji says.

"Sure," Yosuke says. "Whatever. They're awesome."

"You should care about your studies a little more," Souji says.

"Yeah," Chie says.

Souji puts his hand in the air to stop the argument before Yosuke even opens up his mouth. Then he rubs his jaw and says, "Well, I'm feeling a little hungry right now, so why don't we pool our money together and get something to eat?"

They're out in the food court, so it won't do to bust out the pounds of raw meat, like they normally do. Yosuke gets up. "I'll cook," he says.

"Great," Souji says, as they all reach for their wallets. "Well, I'm in a mood for noodles. Pork sounds nice today."

"Me too," said Kanji. "Steak yakisoba."

"I'll have whatever senpai's having," Kujikawa says. Her smile almost seems to glitter. Souji smiles, too, but uncomfortably.

"I'll have the pork and cabbage dish," Yukiko says.

Souji looks, pointedly, to Chie, who frowns and folds her arms over her stomach. "We're going to be eating later, anyway," she says. "It's not like I have to—"

"Just do it," Souji says. "I don't want you to get too… eager."

Chie flushes. Then she says, not looking at Yosuke, "Steak."

"What am I, a waiter?" Yosuke says, his face pained. "Geeze." But he takes their orders and goes to make their food. They all like their meat a little rawer than normal.

"So this is what you guys do on most days," Kujikawa says. She blinks and looks around at all of them. "Wow. It's so much more… normal than I expected."

"Are you all right?" Yukiko says.

"I'm fine," Kujikawa says. She seems different from usual, brighter and bubblier than the girl they met at Marukyu's at the beginning of the month. "Thanks for worrying, Yukiko-senpai. If you want, I can give you a personal show." Kujikawa fingers the collar of her uniform, her gaze sticky and hard to pull away from. Chie puts her hand on Yukiko's arm, and clears her throat.

"So Souji-kun's already told you about everything?" Chie says.

"Yup," says Kujikawa.

"And you're not—"

"Yeah."

Chie gives Kujikawa an odd look. Then she says, "Really?"

"It seems pretty straightforward to me," Kujikawa says, but she bites her lip as she says it. "I mean… what other choice do I have, right? I've eaten normal meat, and I'm still so hungry that I feel like I could die."

"Yeah," Kanji says. "It always feels like that."

" I've already chosen to live," Kujikawa says. "And I can't give up before I find that jerk who did this to us."

Which is, really, the only thing keeping any of them going. Souji puts a hand on Kujikawa's shoulder.

Sometimes it bothers Yukiko a little, though. When they do find who did this to them—well, she doesn't know. She supposes they'll devour the person. And then what? They can't keep doing this forever. She knows that she can't, at least; but the only thing more frightening than planning her life around murders is the idea of starving to death; going berserk and eating everything in her way until someone (Souji—Chie) stops her. Once she starts thinking about it, she can't stop. She puts a hand on top of Chie's, which hasn't left her forearm this entire time, and squeezes it.

* * *

Normally they go into the city to take care of these kinds of things, but today Souji says that he has someone else in mind. Someone, he says, who's been bothering him lately.

They change into their other set of clothes: cheap, Junes-brand things that they'll toss into the TV later. They wait until sunset, when the fog has rolled in, to make their move. Souji points out the person of interest: a boy wearing an orange shirt, huddled by the edge of the Samegawa. He has strange, vaguely fish-like eyes, and seems familiar for reasons that Yukiko finds hard to pin down.

"He was thrown out of his house a few weeks back," Souji says. "I'm fairly certain that he's mad. Keeps talking about devouring people."

"Freak," Yosuke says.

"It happens." Souji shrugs. "He'll be an easy pick. I've never liked him, anyway."

"What?" Kanji says.

"I said that he'll be an easy pick."

"No, what you said after that," Kanji says. "Senpai, ain't that weird?"

"In what way?" Souji says.

They look into one another's eyes for an unusually long time. Kanji looks down at his feet.

"Dunno, senpai," he says. "Guess it's weird to be eating in town."

"Didn't he go to school with us?" Chie says.

"Don't recognize him," Yosuke says, almost off-handedly.

Chie looks to Yukiko. Yukiko looks back. She doesn't understand.

"Oh, never mind," Chie says with a sigh. "Probably just my imagination."

Rise's quiet. She picks at her sweater. Yukiko wonders if she's thinking about backing out. The prospect of that is strangely exciting. But then again, Yukiko still remembers what she tastes like, hot and warm on her tongue, even when she doesn't want to remember. Eating beforehand was a good idea. Yukiko feels as though there are feathers, stabbing at her arms; Konohana-sakuya's way of letting her know that if she doesn't eat something soon, someone else will be in trouble.

"Man, hope there's enough for all of us," Yosuke says. "When can we go after him, partner?"

"Soon," Souji says. "Just wait. He's been well-fed until recently, but he's still weak. Rise-chan, Chie-san, and Kanji-kun are going with me. Yosuke and Yukiko-san will stay back and make sure that no one comes."

"What?" Yosuke says. "But—"

"That's what I say," Souji says. "And that's final."

Yosuke's expression seems to become pinched. Then he says, "Fine. Be that way," and stalks of. Souji watches Yosuke go. Then he says to Rise, "We can't transform outside the TV. Not fully, at least."

"So what do you do?" Rise says.

Souji shrugs. "We make sure that they don't scream."

* * *

Souji and the others head out ten minutes later. Yosuke comes back not long after that. He goes to the gazebo, scanning the road for cars and passersby. Yukiko follows him a second later.

"Man," Yosuke says. "It's not fair."

"Oh?" Yukiko says.

"You don't like it?" Yosuke says.

"I don't know if 'like' is the right word for it," she says.

"Well, you are a girl, after all," he says. He crosses his legs, and yawns. "We'll be getting seconds. Think that's what pisses me off the most. I hate it when I bite into something that someone else has already touched. Unless it's partner's. You know?"

"That's… interesting," Yukiko says, her mind already faraway. She can't smell blood in the air just yet, so she takes that Souji is still setting up the ambush.

Yosuke sits up. "You feel that?"

She doesn't. But she does hear something: a commotion coming from the road. Some boy running down the road, and another man chasing him, yelling, "Stop! Police! Hey, I mean it!"

"Great," Yosuke mutters. "I'm going to tell partner. Can you distract them or something?"

"All right."

Yosuke slinks off to the river. The noise of someone running closer gets louder. She can see a flashlight in the dark, followed by two shadows. What should she do, she wonders. It's too dark for them to see her. There's a chance that she might need to intervene in a more direct manner. She leaves the gazebo and stands on the side of the road. The laughter gets louder. She thinks the officer is Adachi-san, recognizable by his wheeze and crabbiness and general ineffectiveness.

"You can't catch me!" the punk hollers. He's running on a straight line. Adachi is maybe three hundred meters behind. As he runs by, Yukiko grabs the boy by the sleeve and yanks him onto the side of the road. The boy yelps; Yukiko puts a hand over his mouth. He bites, but it's nothing she hasn't felt before, and she tightens her grip on him. It's strange how easy it is to subdue him; and she's filled with the urge to bury her teeth into his neck, bite into the flesh. For a moment, she thinks about dragging this boy away and feasting, by herself, without any of the others knowing. She holds onto the boy's mouth so hard that she feels something break inside of him. It seems like a tooth.

Ah. Better not, then.

When Adachi's ten meters away, Yukiko pushes the punk back onto the road, and the boy falls down, grabbing onto his mouth and swearing and crying at the same time. She retreats, going into the deep grass.

"Got you!" Adachi says. Yukiko hears the metallic click of handcuffs. "Guess I'm better at this than I thought. Heh. Can't believe you tripped like that."

"Someone grabbed me!" says the punk. "There's someone there—they tried to fucking smother me to death!"

"Save it for the station," Adachi says. He doesn't even shine his flashlight to the plains to check. But it seems that for a moment, he's looking at her. Yukiko doesn't move; she knows that a hunter responds best to movement, not color or shape. And after a while, she hears footsteps, headed presumably for the police cruiser. Adachi's flashlight bobs and becomes dim and harder to see. She wipes her hand on the grass, which smells sweet and cloying. The others have started eating. She hopes they'll leave enough for her.


	3. july(the frog remix)

"Fuck!" Yosuke says. "That feels good."

He's volunteered to stay behind to help Souji clean up. Kanji and the others have taken what remains of the body to the shopping district, where they'll dispose of them in the TV. That leaves him and Souji in the floodplains, splashing water on the waters and making sure the blood doesn't smell too bad. Souji lured a dog over and killed it where fish face was, just in case. Souji sucks on a rusty red blade of grass as he shakes the dog around. Yosuke feels a little weird about that. Souji likes animals, right?

"Hmm," Souji says.

"You don't like it?" Yosuke says. He doesn't want to be the only person who likes it. God. He can't be the only one.

"I don't know," Souji says. "I guess so."

"See?" Yosuke says, relieved. God, that poor dog. He thinks it was just a stray, but man, he feels so bad for the damn thing. He doesn't get Souji sometimes. "It was good, right?"

"Yeah."

"I mean," Yosuke says. "I mean—you know…"

"Yeah." Souji rinses his mouth in the river. "Guess I'm a little tired. Ate a little too much."

"Me too," Yosuke says.

Souji gives Yosuke a look. Yosuke smooths his hair back, tries to look cool. His hand tangles in his headphone cables.

"You should go home soon," Souji says.

"I want to help," Yosuke says.

"Better not," Souji says, shaking his head. "Your parents are going to get suspicious of you if you come home too late. Okay?"

Yosuke frowns. But he says, "Okay," and leaves the floodplains.

* * *

The first thing he does when he gets home is stuff his old clothes in the TV. Good riddance, he thinks. Then he takes a shower to wash the evidence out. It's not that Yosuke wants to like it, but he figures that liking it is better than hating it, like Chie, who has to be coaxed into doing this kind of stuff. Yukiko and Kanji seem okay with it, but Yukiko's always been weird. He doesn't get her. It'd be easier if she were weak, like Chie, or strong, like Yosuke is. She's like Souji. They're both quiet people. Maybe they do like it.

His parents aren't home yet, and he's bored and kind of horny. But there's something pathetic about jerking himself off. If only, he thinks, he had a girlfriend. Although, well, that'd be a problem. Maybe if he were dating Chie or Yukiko or Rise.

He feels his pulse quicken. Yeah, he'd like Rise. Not to eat, but maybe she'd let him fuck her because she'd be grateful for it. He's not sure if he wants her teeth or mouth on him, or any part of him. He pictures Rise's fingers wrapping around his dick, long, white and slim, callused from holding the sword and… and… fuck. He stops himself.

This is stupid.

* * *

See, there's one thing—maybe more than one, but this is the only one that bears mentioning right now—that this curse thing has done, and it's made it really, really obvious what people like and don't like. Kanji, for example, likes eating guys. Says something about flavor, but, well, there's not much of a difference between wanting to eat someone and wanting to fuck them. And Kanji really, really likes eating guys. Always asks for the thigh. Kinky homo. Yosuke's not dumb. Putting your teeth around someone, kissing them, running your tongue on their leg, biting in. All of them are the same. Or at least, the desire to do so is.

"Um, no," Chie says. "No, it isn't."

No wonder Chie's ice. She's so damn frigid.

"Oh, come on," Yosuke says.

It's Sunday. He stopped by Chie's house to see how she's doing. Partner's orders. Souji worries that Chie's secretly hurling up dinner or something in the "name of justice." Yosuke can't see why Yukiko can't do it, but Souji said something about the girls being too close to one another for them to be reliable.

He and Chie are playing video games. It's almost summer vacation, so the two of them have even fewer reasons to want to do homework than usual. Yosuke taps out a killer combo, and Chie's life bar goes into the red. Chie growls, a little, under her breath.

"Nothing alike," Chie says. Shit. She's used a health potion. "God, I can't believe how horny you are."

"Whatever," he says. "It's totally natural, okay. You don't think about it at all?"

Dragon fist combo. Goddamn. "Shut up."

"You _do_," Yosuke says. "Wow. That's, like, that's real—shit!" And Chie sends Tiny Fist flying out of the corner. Yosuke's tempted to throw the controller out the window, but doesn't. He does swear, though, at the top of his lungs, because he's mad and he has every fucking right to be mad.

"Oh, grow up," Chie says. "Another round?"

"No," Yosuke says. "Fuck it."

"You're so immature."

"And you're a cold bitch, but at least I'm getting laid."

"By who?" Chie says. "Kanji-kun wouldn't touch you if you paid him."

"Wh—hey!" He's surprised despite himself. It takes him a moment to collect himself. Then he says, "Well, Kanji wishes he could have some of this."

"Oh, please," Chie says.

"He does," Yosuke says, but he doesn't really believe himself. He's sweating for some reason. He tries to not show it. Chie looks a little uncomfortable, too, which makes this even more of a shitfest. She looks too pink and sounds too loud to have vomited her meals. Yosuke's about to go and start a new game when the doorbell rings. Chie's parents are home, so Yosuke doesn't pay it any mind at first until Mrs. Satonaka says, in a queer, shaking kind of voice, "Chie-chan?"

"Yeah?" Chie says.

"Someone's here to see you." But it's clear that it's not Yukiko or Souji or a friend. Chie sets the controller down. Yosuke turns off the TV. They aren't really friends. More like comrades. And times like these mean they have to have each others' backs.

"You stay back," she says. She steps out of her room and goes down. Yosuke peers out of Chie's bedroom window, which overlooks the front door. He sees Adachi there. Adachi waves some papers, looks apologetic. The conversation doesn't look too bad. Adachi rubs the back of his head, nods with exaggerated embarrassment. Yosuke can almost hear the bureaucracy jumping up, crying, "Please sign me! Go to the other department! Don't blame me!"

A second later, Chie comes back up. Her smile is a little strange.

"Hey, it's Adachi," she says. "He wants to talk to you."

"About what?" he says.

"He wants to know where you were last night," she says.

"Geeze." He brushes his hair out of his face, and then leaves her. He goes down the stairs. There is Adachi, with his badly-knotted tie and scruffy hair. "Adachi-san. You wanted something?"

"Hey," Adachi says. "We were wondering how you were doing."

Who was the 'we' in this dumb duo? "Fine, I guess," Yosuke says. "It's really hot."

"Yeah, weather out in the country's nothing to sneeze at." Adachi rubs his nose. "I got some questions to ask you. Where were you last night?"

"Souji's house," Yosuke says, automatically, which is the cover story he always uses. "I hung out at Junes with my friends, then me and Souji went to his place."

"Just the two of you?" Adachi says, and Yosuke knows he's in trouble now.

"Yeah," he says. "Just the two of us."

"Okay," Adachi says. He writes that down.

"What are you investigating, anyway?" Yosuke says.

"Don't worry about it," Adachi says. "Not like a kid like you could ever kill someone, right? Haha. Shirogane's just full of shit."

Shirogane. "What?"

"Forget it," Adachi says. "That wasn't supposed to slip out." He laughs again, high and somehow rough anyway. Adachi's smile is pleasant, but sharp, as though he might actually buy into Shirogane's theory.

He needs to think of what a normal person would say. Has to outsmart Adachi. No way he's going to be caught by this guy. "Has there been another murder?" he says.

"A dog," Adachi says, with a roll of his eyes. "But it's a small town, you know? They send out the homicide detectives to see if a dog's okay."

"I see," Yosuke says. "Sucks for the dog."

"Sure does," Adachi says. "But what can you do?" He shrugs. "Well, thanks for chatting. Stay out of trouble."

Yosuke doesn't like the way Adachi says that. But he smiles, nods, and says, "Yeah, thanks" anyway. There's a sliding sick feeling in his stomach. He's not sure if he pulled that off.

* * *

He calls Souji right after Adachi drives away from Chie's living room. Chie's mother brings over chips, which is nice, but not very filling. He's tempted to ask for steak, but Chie's right there and might crack his head open if he does.

"Hey, partner," Yosuke says when Souji picks up.

"Hi," Souji says. He sounds polite, which is weird, because Souji's never… stiff around him. "I'm busy right now. Can I call you back?"

"Sure," Yosuke says. He hangs up and looks at Chie.

"What's going on?" she says. "That call ended fast."

Yosuke does some calculations. No way that Adachi can get from his house to Souji's in five minutes. Not unless there's a special police helicopter or something.

The weird thing is, Yosuke always knew this day would happen. It kind of has to. There's no way they can keep eating people and _not_ get caught eventually. He always imagined he'd be caught in mid-bite in some seedy alleyway, but this works, too. They can rally the troops and then… and then what?

"Think we've just been busted," he says. "They have detectives talking to Souji. Call Yukiko-san and make sure that she's all right. I'll get Kanji and Rise-chan."

Chie whips out her phone so fast that she actually drops it. When she bends down, Yosuke notes that her shirt doesn't fit her anymore. He can see the space between her boobs. Not that he cares. He calls up Kanji, who doesn't answer. Rise does.

"Hi, Yosuke-senpai!" she says, all bubbly and cheery.

"Hey," he says, trying to channel Souji. "Has anyone come to visit you?"

"Just Dojima-san earlier this morning, to ask if I'm okay again," Rise says. "Why?"

"Me and Souji got slammed with detectives," Yosuke says. "Kanji's not answering his cell, and I'm still waiting to hear if Chie's got a hold on Yukiko-san yet." Judging by the way Chie's gripping her phone, probably not. Damn. "Listen, you live in the shopping district, right? Can you see Kanji's place from your room?"

Something rattled on Rise's end. The window blinds, maybe. Yosuke wound up drawing the curtains of Chie's windows shut just in case. "Sorry, senpai," Rise says. "I can stop by there, if you want."

"No, don't," Yosuke says. "It means they don't suspect you yet." Shit. Chie's shaking her head 'no.' Damn it. Who's doing this to them? Has to be that Shirogane bastard. Yosuke's going to find that skinny son of a gun and tear him from limb to limb. "Stay where you are," he says. "I'll call you later."

"Yukiko's not picking up," Chie says. "What's going on?"

"We've been fucking stung," Yosuke says. "Shit."

"Oh," Chie says. She doesn't look surprised, either; her head moves back a little, as though someone's pushed her back with a finger. So he's not the only one who thinks they either have to go down in a blaze of glory or do some mercy-killing. "So what do we do?"

The question isn't what they would do next, but what they could do next. This is, Yosuke thinks, just a warning. Adachi and the other policemen will be back soon. Yosuke feels a little sweat break on his skin, unrelated to the heat and Chie's stupid refusal to not turn on the air conditioning.

"Let's go to Junes," he says. "I bet the others will be there." He wipes the sweat off of his forehead. "You should probably pack a bag."

"What?" she says.

Yosuke looks around Chie's house. "I don't know if we'll be coming back."

Chie punches his shoulder. "Don't be dumb, Yosuke. Of course we will."

It's annoying being called dumb by a girl who got a sixty on her last math test, but Chie's always had that twisted optimism that they'll someday go back to being normal people who never killed those ten or twelve people that one year way back when.

"Come on," Yosuke says. "At least a change of underw—hey!" Holy shit, she nearly dented her own wall. Crazy girl.

"We'll be back, okay?" Chie says, grabbing him by the ear. "Let's go."

* * *

Yukiko's at Junes, too. She's sitting in the food court with Shirogane. Yosuke takes one look at the empty tables around them, the way Yukiko's fanning herself with one of Junes' plastic menus, and Shirogane's annoyed expression, and knows that Shirogane's here for the same reason Adachi was at Chie's. Yukiko's doing her proper young lady impression, where she floats away into her thoughts and stays there; the fog lifts when she sees Yosuke and Chie. Maybe just Chie.

"Yukiko-san," Yosuke says. He tries to wink. "What's up?"

"Naoto-kun and I were just having a conversation," Yukiko says.

"Just doing my part," Shirogane says. "It isn't safe for girls these days to be out alone."

"I can handle myself, though," Yukiko says. She sounds as though she's been saying that for at least the last hour. She stands, smiles prettily at Shirogane, the way that girls do when they want to take a guy and maul him in a back alley, and says to Chie, "I'm going to the bathroom."

It takes a moment for Chie to catch on. "I'll come with you," she says. She and Yukiko take off. Yosuke takes Yukiko's chair. Shirogane shifts, a little, in his chair; then he meets Yosuke's eyes. It's focused and really uncomfortable. Shirogane's just lucky Yosuke's really straight.

"What?" Yosuke says.

"Where were you last night from between the hours of six and ten o'clock?" he says.

"Dunno," Yosuke says, but privately he thinks his balls just tried to shrink back into his body a bit. "Guess I was hanging out around Junes. Went to Souji's place and had dinner—" Shit, did he really say that? Well, no helping it now. "—and then went back home. I already told Adachi-san the same thing."

"So Adachi-san has reached you already," says Shirogane.

"Yeah," Yosuke says, and remembers what Adachi said about Shirogane's theory. "Yeah, funny thing, huh."

There are spots in Junes where the cameras don't see anything and customers don't go. That's one way to take care of Shirogane. And of course, the other way is to push Shirogane into the TV—but then he's no better than the killer. And he isn't a killer. Or at least, he kills because he has to.

"Forgive us," Shirogane says. "We're conducting an investigation on the disappearance of Mitsuo Kubo." Shirogane reaches into his pocket, and pulls out a photo of the fish face they ate yesterday. Yosuke wonders if Shirogane can see the moment of horrible hesitation that wells in him, then subsides. "He was actually going to help us in an investigation," Shirogane says. "Says he had some information on the disappearance of a Takeru Suzuki."

Yosuke feels a little shiver run up his spine. Takeru Suzuki had been one of their first—sacrifices, that's what Souji calls them. It was the second time they ate at home; all the rest of their meals, they had taken in the city.

"So you guys are actually making some progress on that case?" Yosuke says. "Took you guys long enough. Do you know who's killed Saki-senpai yet?"

"I'm afraid I cannot comment on on-going investigations," Shirogane says. "But rest assured, we are making progress."

Bullshit. If they were making progress, then none of this would be necessary: not jumping into the TV, not turning into these fucking monsters, not the part where they have to eat people to survive.

"Oh yeah?" says Yosuke. "If the police is making so much progress, then why are you spending so much time on a dead dog and banging on all of our houses?"

"Ah," Shirogane says. "You would likely know more about it than I. Wouldn't you say so, Hanamura-san?"

"What's a dog matter to me?" Yosuke says. "I'm not an animal guy."

"But your friend's fingerprints were found on the collar of dog," Shirogane says. "And the dog was found at the place where Kubo was supposed to meet with one of our detectives. It's suspicious, isn't it? Especially with the way you and your friends are always… conveniently showing up or leaving wherever we find a body."

Yosuke's phone rings. Yosuke blinks, and tries to not let anything show on his face.

"I should get that," he says.

"It's best that you don't," Shirogane says.

Chie's behind Shirogane. She's on the phone—is she the one calling him? Doesn't look like it. His phone goes to voicemail, but she's still there. She looks paler than normal. After a while, she hands the phone to Yukiko, who also looks drawn. More bad news, Yosuke guesses. Great. This day is great. Every day is great at your Junes. We're staffed by cannibals. Fire sale prices!

"I would like it if you would submit yourself to voluntary questioning by the police," Shirogane says.

Chie's beckoning him. Yosuke for a moment wants to say, "Look, you want to deal with this guy?" but then Chie mouths something to him: Souji. TV. When that doesn't get the job done, she mimes stuffing someone through a screen.

Yosuke swallows. Then he stands. Shirogane rises, as well.

"Yeah, right," he says.

"I could easily bring you in on formal charges," Shirogane says. "It would be easier for both of us if you came with me."

Chie and Yukiko vanish into the store. He thinks they're going to the bathroom again—what's so great about the bathrooms, anyway?— but no, they're headed for the elevators. He goes in after them, glancing over his shoulder every now and then to make sure that Shirogane is following him. The overhead lights aren't as bright as the sun outside, and it takes Yosuke's vision a second to adjust. There are people everywhere, all of them so—vulnerable. And then there are the giant plastic balls dyed in purple and green and orange and hell, it's normal. Almost.

"Are you listening to me, Hanamura-san?" Shirogane says. He sounds testy. Good.

"Look, can't we talk about it somewhere where we _aren't_ surrounded by people?" Yosuke says. Chie and Yukiko are already in the lobby. Yosuke steps through. Shirogane hesitates, just for a second, before stepping over the threshold himself.

"Are we sufficiently alone now, Hanamura-san?" Shirogane says.

Yosuke looks to the elevators, then to Chie; then to Yukiko. Chie looks away, to the parking lot, then up at the security cameras. Yukiko meets his gaze, steady and calm. It's the look that tragic princesses give their bodyguards before they march up to the sacrificial podium or something. Yosuke knows the feeling.

At least this is an order from Souji. That makes it better. A little. Yukiko presses the elevator call button.

"Someone might come in if we stay here," Yosuke says, and it's almost like he's not the one saying it. He puts his hand on Shirogane's shoulder. "Why don't we go up to the electronics department?"

Shirogane gives Yosuke a look. His hand drifts down to his belt, but there's too much on the line for Yosuke to let Shirogane get the upper hand. Shirogane's scrappy, for a skinny dude, and fights dirty, clawing at Yosuke's face and trying to knee Yosuke in the groin; but then Chie joins in and bashes Shirogane with a kick to the head. Yosuke clamps a hand over Shirogane's mouth. He and Chie haul Shirogane into the waiting elevator. Shirogane tries to bite. Whatever. Yosuke's not afraid of him. Anyway, he isn't afraid of teeth anymore, unless they're near his dick.

"We should do something about the tapes later, Yosuke-kun," Yukiko says.

"No," Yosuke says. "It's a digital feed. Everything gets sent to a server over in Tokyo somewhere. Even if we destroy the cameras, they're going to see it."

"If they find out," Chie says.

Yosuke smiles down at Shirogane, who's glaring up at Yosuke through his bangs and the brim of his hat. It's not an 'if' anymore. Yukiko crosses her arms over her chest. Her mouth is a tight line. She hits the stop button on the elevator. The lights flicker momentarily, then stay strong.

"Come on, you guys," Chie says. "It'll be simple." Shirogane growls, thrashes. Chie kicks him in the gut, and then laughs at it, her eyes wide. "We just—all we have to do is—" She trails off. Looks at Yukiko's grim face, and gets even quieter.

"They've taken Souji-kun and Kanji-kun to the station for questioning," Yukiko says.

"Maybe they'll understand if we just explain—"

"Yeah, sure," Yosuke says. "'Remember us? We killed some people and ate them, but we did it for a good cause!' That'll go well."

"Like anything you do could go well," Chie says.

"Grow up, won't you?" Yosuke says. "This is it! We're not going any farther than this. We're going to take this guy"—he shakes Shirogane at this, who lets out an enraged snarl—"and throw him into the TV, and then we're going to be on the run for the rest of our lives, eating people to get by! Goddamn it!" He tightens his grip on Shirogane's mouth, and looks at Chie and Yukiko. Chie still looks hopeful, but Yukiko has a strained, tense look on her face, as though what he's said struck home. Well, he's right. No way around that.

"We can use Shirogane-san as a hostage," Yukiko says. "One of theirs for one of ours."

"They have Kanji-kun, too," Chie says.

"Adachi-san," says Yosuke. He's never liked that guy, anyway. What a fucking tool.

"We don't have enough people to subdue him," Yukiko says. "And his movements will be irregular because of the… commotion we'll be causing." She tilts her head to the side, and then looks at Chie, who looks back, confused. Yosuke's not sure what she's talking about, either. Yukiko looks down at Shirogane, then sighs. "It'll be easier," she says, "if we take someone we know that Dojima-san cares about."


	4. give up(the power remix)

In the morning, her big brother wakes up and comes downstairs and makes breakfast for her. It's Sunday. Normally Dad would be home, but today Souji says Dad is investigating something and won't be back for a while. He's in a good mood. They're having rice and pickled radishes and sausage patties for breakfast. Nanako thinks about pointing out that the sausage patties aren't healthy and that they should be eating fish instead, but her big brother doesn't look tired or upset today, and he wasn't throwing up into the toilet again, so she eats her breakfast without complaints. The food is good as usual. She wishes Souji would make more vegetables.

After breakfast, her big brother goes to his room to do some homework. Nanako does the laundry. She knocks on Souji's door around noon, and asks for his clothes. He tells her that he can wash his own clothes.

"No, you shouldn't," she says. "I should do it."

Souji opens the door, and smiles down at her. "It's all right, Nanako," he says. "I really, really want to do my own laundry."

"What are you hiding?" she says.

Souji's smile doesn't falter. "I'm not hiding anything, Nanako," he says, and closes the door.

Nanako stomps her foot. "If you loved me, you'd let me do your laundry!"

Souji opens the door. He looks concerned, which is good, because she's worried about him, too. Then he says, "All I have are socks and underwear to wash."

"I can do that," she says.

"No," he says. "I'll do it myself."

"You're going to waste water," she says.

"It's my underwear," he says, and his cheeks are a little pink. He shuts the door, muttering, "It'll be embarrassing."

"You're the embarrassing one!" she says to the door, and this time she hears a laugh on the other side of the door.

Her big brother can be mean sometimes. If he loved her, he would let her in.

Dad calls while Nanako is thinking about eating lunch. Dad says all the usual things: that he's sorry that it's Sunday and he's working, that he wants to be home, that he hopes she's being safe. Then his voice gets all funny.

"Is Souji home?" he says.

"Yeah," Nanako says. "Is he in trouble?"

"No, Nanako," Dad says, and he's lying to her, like all big people have been lying to her. "I just want to ask him some questions, that's all."

"What did he do?" Nanako says.

"I can't tell you that," Dad says, in the mortified, confused way that he has when he's afraid to tell her something. "Why don't you keep your big brother company? Make sure he stays in the house. Will you do that for me, Nanako?"

Nanako looks up the stairs, where she knows Souji is, and then at the phone receiver.

Just some questions, Dad says. Just some questions.

"When will you be back home?" she says.

"Soon," he says. "I promise."

"You promised," she says, and her voice wavers. And she knows that he's promised because he loves her, even if he can't keep it. Not like her brother, who won't promise things even if he'll do things. Not like her brother, who's in trouble and won't tell her why. "I love you, Daddy."

"Of course," Dad says. "I love you, too."

* * *

Around two o'clock, her brother steps out of his room all dressed up. His clothes don't fit him that well anymore. He looks shabby.

"Are you going?" Nanako says.

"There's something I need to take care of," he says.

"But I'm not done with the laundry yet," she says.

"Are you still going on about that?" Souji says, and he sounds so annoyed with her that she shrinks away because she's sure that she's done something wrong. But then she shakes her head. She's not the one who's done anything wrong, she tells herself. It's Souji who's being thickheaded about this, who won't listen to reason or to her or to anyone.

"Why won't you let me do it?" she says.

"I told you already," Souji says. "There isn't anything to wash."

Nanako's so mad at him that she thinks she could cry. He's being stupid. This isn't how it's supposed to go. She's supposed to ask for his dirty clothes and he's supposed to give them to her and then they go in the wash and then she'll hang them out to dry.

"I'm going to your room," she says. Souji's face hardens, but she's determined to do this. She goes up the stairs, and Souji follows her, his footsteps heavy behind her.

"Don't go in there, Nanako," he says, and she almost doesn't, because it sounds like a threat. But there's no reason for him to hide things from her. She runs up the last few steps and flings the door open before Souji can reach her.

She planned to go straight for his hamper, but can't move from the doorway. His room is dark with the curtains drawn. The TV is on. There's a camera on his desk. His futon has been left out. It looks like he's slashed it apart in his sleep. His walls have scratches in them, as though he's been clawing them. Souji grabs her by the back of the neck, and she screams, because she's afraid of the person who lives in here—and then Souji pulls her out of his bedroom.

"Why did you do that, Nanako?" he says.

"I wish I hadn't," she says. "I wish I never went in there. I wish you never came here!" she says, and runs into her room and shuts the door. She knows that she's supposed to keep Souji in the house, but she doesn't care anymore. She doesn' care about any of it. Souji knocks on her door.

"Nanako," he says.

She doesn't answer. She goes to the corner of her room and curls up there. He enters, because she didn't lock the door when she came in.

"I'm sorry," she says.

"It's okay," he says. "Hey, I'm going to make something for you. What do you want?"

"I don't want anything," she says.

"Cream puffs. Do you like those?"

"No."

"Cookies, then," he says.

She doesn't say anything. She hears Dad pulling into the driveway. Dad is going to ask questions and Souji is going to answer them and it'll be okay again. Souji won't be in trouble and he won't be weird and everything will go away.

Souji's phone rings. He answers it and steps away from Nanako and onto the stairwell. Nanako hears the front door open. Souji puts his phone in his pocket. He looks, in a single panicked motion, to his room. He ducks back in there. Nanako watches from her room. She sees something strange: Souji takes his notebooks and his camera and makes them disappear inside the TV. After Souji leaves, Nanako runs up to the TV in his room and puts her palm on the glass.

* * *

They go through the shopping district and residential districts. Chie watches out for anyone suspicious. She knows that Yukiko won't notice. Yukiko's always been slow to recognize danger and risk, even now. She tries to hide it so Yukiko won't get mad at her, but Chie still has to watch out for Yukiko. They're both going to move on from this. They'll be fixed and cured and then everything will be okay again. Chie will do anything to make sure that happens. Anything. Even if it means never speaking to Yukiko again.

As they approach the Dojima house, Yukiko says, "Maybe you should be the one to pick her up. I'm not sure she likes me very much."

Pick Nanako up—and then what? Toss her into a TV? Yukiko acts like of course Chie knows what she wants to do, but Chie doesn't. Kill, kidnap, TV, not TV.

"Chie?" Yukiko says.

"I don't want to hurt her," Chie says.

"We won't," Yukiko says, but Yukiko sounds confused in a way that normal people shouldn't. Chie's chest feels tight.

"We're going to," Chie says. "What if she gets what we have?"

"She's too young to have a Shadow," Yukiko says.

"Teddie had one, and he was empty."

There's a beat.

Yukiko takes Chie's hand, and squeezes it tentatively, as though she's afraid Chie will shake her off. Chie squeezes back.

"Isn't there somewhere else?" Chie says.

"You know that there can't be anywhere else, Chie," Yukiko says, and she sounds so tired that that Chie almost wants to give up. But then they're on Souji's street, halfway up the hill, and she knows she has to try.

"There has to be somewhere," she says. "A back room in the Inn, or the mountains in the back of the Inn or…"

"We can't," Yukiko says, but it doesn't have that same decisiveness that Souji's ever had. But Souji is never going to forgive them. Maybe he will. She doesn't know. Almost like Yukiko's reading her mind—when did Yukiko learn how to do that?—she says, "This is for Souji-kun and Kanji-kun, Chie."

That does it.

"Yeah," Chie says. "I know."

* * *

They write the ransom note together, alternating words in hopes that it won't look anyone's handwriting. They fight, half-heartedly, about whose it looks more like. Chie wants it to look more like hers than Yukiko's. Has to. Yukiko, at least, has to get out of this. She doesn't want anything linking Yukiko back to this. They put it next to the front door and weigh it down with a rock. Then Chie rings the bell. Yukiko stands in the driveway, just out of the line of sight of anyone standing in the door.

Nanako answers the door a second later, half-hiding behind it. "Chie-chan?"

"Hi, Nanako-chan," Chie says. She wonders if she looks as nauseous and exhausted and nervous as she feels. "Is Dojima-san home?"

"No," she says.

"Can I come in?" Chie says.

"Big bro isn't home."

"I know, Nanako-chan," Chie says, and she wants to hug her or apologize or… or something. "He's at Junes."

"With Daddy?" Nanako says.

"No."

"Because big bro went with Daddy," she says.

"Oh yeah?" Chie says. "Well, Souji-kun's at Junes with Yosuke-kun, and they thought we should pick you up for a while, you know?"

Nanako doesn't look like she believes her. It hurts.

"Come on," Chie says, and hopes that she won't have to force Nanako. She holds her hand out to Nanako.

"Where's big bro?" she says. "He's in trouble. Daddy is going to punish him."

"Junes," Chie says.

"You're lying." The door begins to close. Chie sticks her foot in the gap before Nanako can shut. Nanako tries to slam it, but Chie steps in further.

"I'm not lying," Chie says. She's still holding her hand out. "Not if you come with me."

* * *

(What is a cannibal, Nanako asked her big brother a few weeks ago.

Well, now she knows.)

* * *

Chie feels like a total creep. Nanako walks just ahead of both Chie and Yukiko, so at least Nanako thinks both of them are terrible people. Chie feels like throwing up again. Yukiko doesn't look bothered, but this whole thing is Yukiko's idea to begin with.

And that's the thing. It was Yukiko's idea. Not Yosuke's, which—it would've been awful, but not so surprising. Yosuke's been—changed by all of this, and Souji—maybe, maybe not. And as for Yukiko—

Chie's just bullied a little girl into a TV, so if Yukiko's changed, then at least she's changed with her.

There are police cars pulled into the Junes parking lot in a furtive spot, and people with guns inside. There aren't any shoppers inside. Chie holds onto Nanako's hand, because Nanako won't take Yukiko's. They're walking into a trap, but to go into a TV they've never been through, especially without Rise to guide them.

"Do you see anyone?" Yukiko says, trying to not move her head too much as they walk to the elevator. The security cameras seem to be trained on them. Maybe they are. Who knows if Shirogane's relationship with the police is as bad as it seems. If it is, then they'll be okay, but if not…

"I see someone looking at the dishes."

Yukiko has her thinking look on. "Junes does have a nice silverware deal right now."

Chie kind of feels like that's beside the point. Silverware? Now?

"Don't worry," Yukiko says, and strokes Chie's hair. They enter the elevator. "We have Nanako-chan."

There's a moment where Chie's entire body stiffens, like it's suddenly gotten cold, but her neck and the back of her head feel like they're going to burst into flame. The door closes. Chie tries to pretend that there wasn't a policeman with a walkie-talkie in the corner.

"This is crazy," Chie says. "I mean, this is really crazy."

"Are you sick?" Yukiko says, pressing the button to the second floor.

"What do you think?" Chie says. She gestures to Nanako, who doesn't look happy with… well, any of this, and then she looks at the security camera, which caught the whole Shirogane thing.

"Maybe this really is the end," Yukiko says.

"Don't say that," Chie says. "We're definitely going to make it."

"Maybe."

"You're so—" Chie feels the urge to grab Yukiko, shake, pull her into and—but there's Nanako right there, and the elevator dings as they arrive. There's Adachi in the electronics department, near the TVs. He's waiting for them, leaning against a box with a long, hard smile.

"Hey, Satonaka-san," he says. "Nanako-chan. Amagi-san."

Nanako doesn't look like she wants to be near Adachi anymore than she wants to be around Yukiko or Chie.

"What do you want?" Chie says.

"Haha," Adachi says. "Just a quick conversation, that's all." He's looking at them, like he's considering something. Then he says, "Who thought it would've been you kids, huh."

They're going to have to get rid of Adachi, somehow. Chie feels her head get light.

"You don't have to worry," Adachi says. "I've come alone. Just me."

"So what's with all the officers?" Chie says.

"Well," Adachi says. "They're just there in case things get nasty. C'mon. We got the tapes. First Shirogane and now Dojima-san's girl? You guys pull a mean game."

Chie holds onto Nanako's hand a little tighter. Yukiko steps forward.

"We haven't done anything," Yukiko says.

"Haha," Adachi says. "Where are you girls going?"

"It isn't any of your business," says Yukiko says, all stiff and proper and with a hint of steel.

"Come on, Amagi-san, don't resist it," Adachi says. "You're outnumbered."

"Not here," Chie says. She pushes Nanako forward to Yukiko. "And not right now."

"Yeah?" Adachi says. "You know, I don't even feel sorry for you anymore. Don't make trouble."

Yeah, whatever. She's eaten. She feels fine. She jumps forward, and Adachi draws his gun—she kicks it out of his hand, and spin kicks his head. He staggers, falls forward, then grabs onto the edge of a TV and tosses it onto the ground. It breaks onto the ground with a smash.

"Don't just stand there!" Chie says to Yukiko. "You have to get Nanako-chan to safety!"

"Right," Yukiko says, grabbing onto Nanako. Chie wants to say something else—maybe something like, 'I'll be there soon,' but then Adachi grab her chest with his hands and twists. He's mostly holding onto her uniform, but the pain still jolts her like a shock. She bashes her head against his nose, and like an idiot, hits him with her forehead. Even when he drops to the ground, she's tempted to fall over and grab her head, too. She knees him in the face, and then hits him again—his head bends into her bones, and she pretends to not feel it.

She lets him fall. Yukiko is there to catch her when her legs go weak.

"Nanako-chan," Chie says.

"I already put her in," Yukiko says. It sounds a little surreal coming from her mouth. She looks down at Adachi, and then draws in a deep breath. "He's still alive. I think."

"Right," Chie says. They don't kill people unless it's absolutely necessary, and even then, Souji's the one who picks the targets—she doesn't know how, and doesn't want to know how. She's relieved that Adachi's still alive.

"We should get rid of him," Yukiko says.

"But that'll make us—"

"Murderers?"

Well, there's that. "Cop-killers."

Yukiko doesn't even blink. But her brow furrows in a familiar way. "Are detectives cops?"

"Yukiko," Chie says. She's tired and doesn't want to think like this.

"I'm sorry," Yukiko says. "It's just—" There's a pop, and then Yukiko falls forward, clutching at her chest. There's blood—Chie knows that smell too well—and then something hot splashes onto Chie's skin. Adachi's standing, gun still pointed at Yukiko; his face, bloody and broken, is livid. There's another shot, and Chie feels something hot strike her shoulder. She grabs Yukiko and pulls her to their TV. There are a few more shots of the gun, which make Yukiko flinch, but the bullets miss their mark. Chie knocks over some other TVs to provide a screen. They make it to their TV without taking any more hits.

"You should go first," Yukiko says.

"No, you should," Chie says.

"You have to promise that you'll come with me at the same time," Yukiko says. "No heroics, Chie. If something were to happen to you, I don't know what I'd do, Chie, if you—"

"Okay," Chie says, because she needs Yukiko to stop talking before the detective's bullet ends up in her head. "I promise."

"Okay," Yukiko says. "Good."

She has a pretty smile. Chie finds herself smiling back. They reach into the TV with their hands, and Chie knows she promised, but she has to make sure Yukiko makes it safely. The last thing she sees before everything goes black is Yukiko turning back to look at her, eyes wide.


	5. give up(the winter remix)

"Are you all right?" Yosuke says. A dumb, dumb thing to say when Yukiko's staring at a Chie's dead body like it's a squashed bug or dried fish. She's sitting in blood, her legs folded beneath her. She looks pretty as always. There's a part of Yosuke that wants to press his lips to her neck, to push her hair away from her face and then cut his teeth into her cheek. God. This is so fucked up.

Nanako's pressed her face into his pants. Yukiko says nothing. Nanako is going to be so fucking traumatized by this. He feels sorry for her, honestly sorry. When he pets her hair, she hits him.

"You know," Yosuke says. "I'm sad, too, but it…" It's kind of inevitable. He's just surprised Chie's the first to go. And at least Chie died doing what she always liked doing best. And, well, meat is meat. He was getting kind of hungry, anyway. "I mean, I'm sorry and all but…"

"I don't understand," Yukiko says. "There isn't anything left."

"Come on," Yosuke says. "That's a little melodramatic, isn't it?" He tries to help her up, but she pushes him aside. Nanako's holding onto his leg so tightly that Yosuke swears there's going to be a Nanako-shaped bruise on his thigh later. "Have you heard anything about Souji yet?"

"Of course not," Yukiko says. She runs a hand through Chie's hair, apparently not caring for the blood or the… Yosuke watches, and then turns away.

He says, "She'd want you to save Souji."

"No, she wouldn't," Yukiko says.

"No, she would." When Yukiko doesn't react, just tilts Chie's head so she can see the face, he says, "Fine. Be that way."

He means it to sound angry, but it's hard to argue with her when she's so sad. He's not sad. He knew this would happen one day. Sure, it sucks that it happened to Chie—but they have to go, they have to keep going, they have to… He's ready to go, but he stops.

"What are we going to do with the body?" Yosuke says.

"Don't you _dare_," Yukiko says.

"I wasn't."

"Good," she says, and raises Chie hands, limp and cooling. She kisses them.

Yosuke wipes his nose. He clutches Nanako's shoulders. Then he says, "I'm going to put Nanako-chan somewhere safe."

"Make sure you don't put her near Teddie," Yukiko says. But it almost sounds like she doesn't care.

* * *

They're keeping Shirogane in the dungeon, tied up to Yukiko's tossed-over throne. The carpet's a mess. This is where they kept Teddie, before they gave up and left him in the strange bedroom with the scarf. There are red marks on Shirogane's wrist. He's not thrashing around anymore, but when Yosuke shows up with Nanako, he says, "I see that you have moved onto kidnapping children."

"Fuck you," Yosuke says. "She's Souji's sister. We're keeping her safe."

"Safe from what?" Shirogane says. He's panting. The fog, Yosuke knows. It'll eat away at him soon enough unless someone saves him. Yosuke touches Shirogane's forehead. Shirogane snarls, and says, "Murderers."

"We're not going to keep her in for long," Yosuke says. "Just long enough to get what we need."

They'll have to do something about Shirogane soon. Move him. Or turn him.

"Are you planning on cannibalizing her as well?" Shirogane says. "How many people are in on your operation?"

"You know something?" Yosuke says. "Why don't you shut the fuck up? She's his sister."

"Daichi Gouda-san," says Shirogane, "had a sister. Hana Nitori-san. Takashi Mori-san, parents, grandparents. Amano Jun-san. Tomoyo Suzuki-san. But you and your friends don't think, do you? You're monsters. All you ever do is eat."

Nanako's forehead is sweaty against Yosuke's arm; but she says, "Did big bro do something?"

"We're only doing what's right," Yosuke says, choosing to ignore her. He doesn't want to have to explain. "Because you people can't do shit. Saki-senpai died, Mayumi Yamano—"

_Haaaa_. The laugh is long and exhausted, and almost hysterical. Shirogane looks half-dead. Yosuke wants to let him go. He's not hungry after yesterday's meal, but he thinks he could make room for Shirogane.

"Do you think," Shirogane says, "that anyone cares about Konishi-san or Yamano-san now?"

"I care," Yosuke says. "Souji cares. Why the fuck don't you? That's the problem with the police. Someone's out there murdering innocent people, and you people can't do jack!" His words sound crazy, even to him, but he can't stop, he can't. He can feel the demon inside him, roaring in his ear, stealing his air and lighting his skin up with an orange light. He throws Nanako off of his leg, and grabs Shirogane, pulls him up. "You don't understand," he says. "You don't understand anything. If you guys could just do your jobs, Saki-senpai—Chie—you got it all wrong…"

Shirogane doesn't tremble or shake, just meets Yosuke's eyes. He looks scared. Good. He should be. Yosuke's wrists are Jiraiya's, black and plated. He shuts his eyes. The transformation fades.

"Hey," Yosuke says. "You're going to die here in a few days. You know that, right?"

Shirogane raises his head.

"What about Nanako-chan, then?" Shirogane says.

"We'll let her out before that," Yosuke says. "But you? It's just like you said. We're monsters, right? We'll be hungry later. Serves you right, for pinning everything on us."

He rises. Nanako isn't looking at him. He shuts his eyes. Good.

"You two should be safe here," Yosuke says. "The monsters won't find you up here, and Teddie stays out of places like these. Don't leave this room."

"Who's Teddie?" Nanako says.

* * *

When he returns, Yukiko has her teeth deep in Chie's thigh. She looks like she's been crying the whole time. Her black hair falls all around her, matted and knotted up with her blood and Chie's. Her atma glows red on her breast.

"Hey!" Yosuke says, reflexively angry, but Yukiko looks at him through the tears and the blood and snot and says to him, "She's _mine_," and keeps on crying. She's working leg up; Konohana-sakuya's fanned wings grow, metallic, out of her wrist and forearms. Yosuke, for a moment, hovers over her, puts a hand between her shoulder blades. Her wings cut into him when she pushes him aside. He's bleeding from the leg, and the smell of his own blood is enough to push him back into Jiraiya.

"I'm going to kill him," she says.

"It wasn't Souji's fault," Yosuke says. He grabs her by the neck, pulls her up. "Come on, we need to help Souji already."

Her neck, soft and human, ripples and widens in his hand. He just has enough sense to release her and rush out of her range. A storm of flame swirls around Yukiko. She looks different, less pink and more golden. Maybe that's the difference, between eating a normal person and eating someone with a demon in them. Yosuke wonders what would happen if he took a bite of Chie. Now's not the time. Instead, he approaches Yukiko, hands out. Fire swirls around her, red and hot.

"Hey," he says. "Hey."

"No, no," she says as he gets near. "No, she's mine, she's _mine_…"

"I know, I know," he says. Her shoulders crumple; she lets herself fall into him. There's blood soaking into his shirt, but the fire is dying.

"It was Adachi," she says, muffled. "He killed her. We have to get him, Yosuke-kun. We have to."

"Just give me your phone," Yosuke says. "We need to make the exchange. Souji for Nanako-chan. Kanji for Shirogane."

"When I find him," says Yukiko, and the anger distorts her voice, "I won't even eat him. I'll rip him apart. I'll pull his eyes out. I'll make him burn."

The phone she gives him is Chie's.

_Watch him burn_, she says, and bends over Chie again. But this time, as a demon.

* * *

He exits the TV. The electronics section is empty. He calls the police station and makes the exchange. Souji for Nanako. Kanji for Shirogane. Leave them in Junes at five. Dojima sounds shocked and disbelieving when he recognizes Yosuke's voice. Horrified when he finds the note Chie and Yukiko had left.

They're going to have to do something about that TV, Yosuke thinks. They'll need to move it somewhere safe. Or maybe they can go in through some other TV and make that their base.

When the time comes, he goes back into the TV and gets Shirogane and Nanako. Nanako is feverish and cold in his arms; Shirogane's weak, but conscious and furious. At five, Kanji's big, pale head shows up over the row of TVs.

"Senpai escaped already," Kanji says by way of explanation. "They put us in the same interrogation room. He jumped straight through."

"A TV?" Yosuke says. "Shit." He doesn't want to think about trying to find Souji down there. He'll have to find Teddie and yell at him: _Remember? Remember your sensei, you dumbass bear?_ Goddamn it. "What the hell was he thinking?"

"He says it looked familiar," Kanji says. He reaches for Nanako, then stops. "Senpai said to let Nanako-chan go."

"Duh," Yosuke says. Like they were planning on keeping her in there. What's the point in any of this if Nanako ends up dead?

"Senpai says we should let Shirogane go, too," Kanji says. "Think he's gonna be all right?"

""Beats me," Yosuke says. But he doesn't like the idea of letting Shirogane run free. He slings Nanako's body over one shoulder, and pulls Shirogane up by the hair with the other. "Why don't you get back in the TV? Just be careful. Yukiko-san's still trying to finish off Chie."

"What?"

"It's been a bad day."

Kanji hesitates for a moment, and then vanishes into the TV.

He and Shirogane are alone now. But Yosuke isn't going to let Shirogane go just yet. No. He drags Shirogane to the escalators, and sets Nanako's body, gently, against a wall. Shirogane knows too much; and he doesn't like the way Shirogane has the wrong idea about them.

"What are you doing?" Shirogane says, his voice cracking.

"Just something to make you understand us," Yosuke says. He looks at his own forearm, grimaces, and takes a bite. It hurts like hell. He only needs a little bit of flesh, but for a moment, he wishes he could have fed Shirogane a bit of Kanji instead. Ha. Sucks for him, he guesses. Shirogane watches, fascinated—then that fascination turns to horror when Yosuke pries his mouth open.

There's only one reliable way to make someone an asura, and that's to feed them tainted flesh. Normally people who get thrown in the TV just go nuts or get sick—but Teddie had given them all a bit of his flesh, He slides the meat into Shirogane's mouth, and then clamps his hand down over Shirogane's jaw and strokes his throat. Shirogane's thrashing beneath him, panting and panicking and it's both the worst and best thing Yosuke's seen in a while. He continues stroking Shirogane's throat, and a part of him flutters when Shirogane swallows.

Yosuke stands up. Shirogane gasps. Gags.

He thought it'd feel better than this, but it just makes him feel lousy. But it's too late now. Who knows. Maybe Shirogane will be one of the lucky ones who die instead of becoming a crazy monster. Maybe Shirogane will want to work with them.

He leaves Shirogane there, open-eyed and furious, and isn't sorry, not one bit.

* * *

There's smoke coming out of Yukiko's back when Yosuke returns. She's unconscious in Kanji's hands. Kanji's thunder tattoo blazes high on his shoulder.

"The hell was she doing?" Kanji says. "What the fuck was she doing?"

"What do you think she was doing?" Yosuke says. It's easier to be contrarian and angry than it is to explain himself. Explain all of this. "Geeze, couldn't you put it off until she finished eating Chie? Great."

Kanji punches Yosuke, hard on the temple. Yosuke crumples to the floor. His knees slide in the blood, and he ends up skidding until he's next to the body, right where Yukiko was bent earlier. He looks at it, and then chokes. God, this isn't how he wanted anyone to die, this isn't what he wanted his life to be. He wants Souji, he wants someone. He wants his friend. He blots out the tears, and quickly turns Chie over, so she's face-up.

"Can't believe this is what happens to us when things start heading even a little bit south," Kanji says. "We start killing and eating each other?"

"She was already dead," Yosuke says. "When I saw what Yukiko-san was doing—shot in the back of the head. She did it herself. What's the point, anyway, this is the end for all of us. There's nothing after this—nothing, nothing—"

"Maybe you got nothing," Kanji says. He picks up Chie, all that's left of her, and says, "I'm going to rescue senpai. Gonna need to get Teddie, too. You coming with me or not?"

Yosuke picks himself up, his legs shaking. The whole front of his pants is covered in blood. Everything is bloody. "What are you going to do with the body?"

"Bury it," Kanji says. "You asshole."

They leave it in a room just off a dead end in Yukiko's castle. Neither of them try to memorize the way back. The foggy television, the blood-red walls, the bear-like cries echoing in the dark. The next time it rains, the people outside will find the body hanging somewhere from the wires. He hopes there will be a body. Saki-senpai had come back in chunks, and Mayumi Yamano nothing but half a jaw, the rest of her eaten by shadows.


	6. give in(the face it remix)

In the morning, her big brother wakes up and comes downstairs and makes breakfast for her. It's Sunday. Normally Dad would be home, but today Souji says Dad is investigating something and won't be back for a while. He's in a good mood. They're having rice and pickled radishes and sausage patties for breakfast. Nanako thinks about pointing out that the sausage patties aren't healthy and that they should be eating fish instead, but her big brother doesn't look tired or upset today, and he wasn't throwing up into the toilet again, so she eats her breakfast without complaints. The food is good as usual. She wishes Souji would make more vegetables.

After breakfast, her big brother goes to his room to do some homework. Nanako does the laundry. She knocks on Souji's door around noon, and asks for his clothes. He tells her that he can wash his own clothes.

"No, you shouldn't," she says. "I should do it."

Souji opens the door, and smiles down at her. "It's all right, Nanako," he says. "I really, really want to do my own laundry."

"What are you hiding?" she says.

Souji's smile doesn't falter. "I'm not hiding anything, Nanako," he says, and closes the door.

Nanako stomps her foot. "If you loved me, you'd let me do your laundry!"

Souji opens the door. He looks concerned, which is good, because she's worried about him, too. Then he says, "All I have are socks and underwear to wash."

"I can do that," she says.

"No," he says. "I'll do it myself."

"You're going to waste water," she says.

"It's my underwear," he says, and his cheeks are a little pink. He shuts the door, muttering, "It'll be embarrassing."

"You're the embarrassing one!" she says to the door, and this time she hears a laugh on the other side of the door.

Her big brother can be mean sometimes. If he loved her, he would let her in.

Dad calls while Nanako is thinking about eating lunch. Dad says all the usual things: that he's sorry that it's Sunday and he's working, that he wants to be home, that he hopes she's being safe. Then his voice gets all funny.

"Is Souji home?" he says.

"Yeah," Nanako says. "Is he in trouble?"

"No, Nanako," Dad says, and he's lying to her, like all big people have been lying to her. "I just want to ask him some questions, that's all."

"What did he do?" Nanako says.

"I can't tell you that," Dad says, in the mortified, confused way that he has when he's afraid to tell her something. "Why don't you keep your big brother company? Make sure he stays in the house. Will you do that for me, Nanako?"

Nanako looks up the stairs, where she knows Souji is, and then at the phone receiver.

Just some questions, Dad says. Just some questions.

"When will you be back home?" she says.

"Soon," he says. "I promise."

"You promised," she says, and her voice wavers. And she knows that he's promised because he loves her, even if he can't keep it. Not like her brother, who won't promise things even if he'll do things. Not like her brother, who's in trouble and won't tell her why. "I love you, Daddy."

"Of course," Dad says. "I love you, too."

* * *

Around two o'clock, her brother steps out of his room all dressed up. His clothes don't fit him that well anymore. He looks shabby.

"Are you going?" Nanako says.

"There's something I need to take care of," he says.

"But I'm not done with the laundry yet," she says.

"Are you still going on about that?" Souji says, and he sounds so annoyed with her that she shrinks away because she's sure that she's done something wrong. But then she shakes her head. She's not the one who's done anything wrong, she tells herself. It's Souji who's being thickheaded about this, who won't listen to reason or to her or to anyone.

"Why won't you let me do it?" she says.

"I told you already," Souji says. "There isn't anything to wash."

Nanako's so mad at him that she thinks she could cry. He's being stupid. This isn't how it's supposed to go. She's supposed to ask for his dirty clothes and he's supposed to give them to her and then they go in the wash and then she'll hang them out to dry.

"I'm going to your room," she says. Souji's face hardens, but she's determined to do this. She goes up the stairs, and Souji follows her, his footsteps heavy behind her.

"Don't go in there, Nanako," he says, and she almost doesn't, because it sounds like a threat. But there's no reason for him to hide things from her. She runs up the last few steps and flings the door open before Souji can reach her.

She planned to go straight for his hamper, but can't move from the doorway. His room is dark with the curtains drawn. The TV is on. There's a camera on his desk. His futon has been left out. It looks like he's slashed it apart in his sleep. His walls have scratches in them, as though he's been clawing them. Souji grabs her by the back of the neck, and she screams, because she's afraid of the person who lives in here—and then Souji pulls her out of his bedroom.

"Why did you do that, Nanako?" he says.

"I wish I hadn't," she says. "I wish I never went in there. I wish you never came here!" she says, and runs into her room and shuts the door. She knows that she's supposed to keep Souji in the house, but she doesn't care anymore. She doesn' care about any of it. Souji knocks on her door.

"Nanako," he says.

She doesn't answer. She goes to the corner of her room and curls up there. He enters, because she didn't lock the door when she came in.

"I'm sorry," she says.

"It's okay," he says. "Hey, I'm going to make something for you. What do you want?"

"I don't want anything," she says.

"Cream puffs. Do you like those?"

"No."

"Cookies, then," he says.

She doesn't say anything. She hears Dad pulling into the driveway. Dad is going to ask questions and Souji is going to answer them and it'll be okay again. Souji won't be in trouble and he won't be weird and everything will go away.

Souji's phone rings. He answers it and steps away from Nanako and onto the stairwell. Nanako hears the front door open. Souji puts his phone in his pocket. He looks, in a single panicked motion, to his room. He ducks back in there. Nanako watches from her room. She sees something strange: Souji takes his notebooks and his camera and makes them disappear inside the TV. After Souji leaves, Nanako runs up to the TV in his room and puts her palm on the glass.

* * *

They go through the shopping district and residential districts. Chie watches out for anyone suspicious. She knows that Yukiko won't notice. Yukiko's always been slow to recognize danger and risk, even now. She tries to hide it so Yukiko won't get mad at her, but Chie still has to watch out for Yukiko. They're both going to move on from this. They'll be fixed and cured and then everything will be okay again. Chie will do anything to make sure that happens. Anything. Even if it means never speaking to Yukiko again.

As they approach the Dojima house, Yukiko says, "Maybe you should be the one to pick her up. I'm not sure she likes me very much."

Pick Nanako up—and then what? Toss her into a TV? Yukiko acts like of course Chie knows what she wants to do, but Chie doesn't. Kill, kidnap, TV, not TV.

"Chie?" Yukiko says.

"I don't want to hurt her," Chie says.

"We won't," Yukiko says, but Yukiko sounds confused in a way that normal people shouldn't. Chie's chest feels tight.

"We're going to," Chie says. "What if she gets what we have?"

"She's too young to have a Shadow," Yukiko says.

"Teddie had one, and he was empty."

There's a beat.

Yukiko takes Chie's hand, and squeezes it tentatively, as though she's afraid Chie will shake her off. Chie squeezes back.

"Isn't there somewhere else?" Chie says.

"You know that there can't be anywhere else, Chie," Yukiko says, and she sounds so tired that that Chie almost wants to give up. But then they're on Souji's street, halfway up the hill, and she knows she has to try.

"There has to be somewhere," she says. "A back room in the Inn, or the mountains in the back of the Inn or…"

"We can't," Yukiko says, but it doesn't have that same decisiveness that Souji's ever had. But Souji is never going to forgive them. Maybe he will. She doesn't know. Almost like Yukiko's reading her mind—when did Yukiko learn how to do that?—she says, "This is for Souji-kun and Kanji-kun, Chie."

That does it.

"Yeah," Chie says. "I know."

* * *

They write the ransom note together, alternating words in hopes that it won't look anyone's handwriting. They fight, half-heartedly, about whose it looks more like. Chie wants it to look more like hers than Yukiko's. Has to. Yukiko, at least, has to get out of this. She doesn't want anything linking Yukiko back to this. They put it next to the front door and weigh it down with a rock. Then Chie rings the bell. Yukiko stands in the driveway, just out of the line of sight of anyone standing in the door.

Nanako answers the door a second later, half-hiding behind it. "Chie-chan?"

"Hi, Nanako-chan," Chie says. She wonders if she looks as nauseous and exhausted and nervous as she feels. "Is Dojima-san home?"

"No," she says.

"Can I come in?" Chie says.

"Big bro isn't home."

"I know, Nanako-chan," Chie says, and she wants to hug her or apologize or… or something. "He's at Junes."

"With Daddy?" Nanako says.

"No."

"Because big bro went with Daddy," she says.

"Oh yeah?" Chie says. "Well, Souji-kun's at Junes with Yosuke-kun, and they thought we should pick you up for a while, you know?"

Nanako doesn't look like she believes her. It hurts.

"Come on," Chie says, and hopes that she won't have to force Nanako. She holds her hand out to Nanako.

"Where's big bro?" she says. "He's in trouble. Daddy is going to punish him."

"Junes," Chie says.

"You're lying." The door begins to close. Chie sticks her foot in the gap before Nanako can shut. Nanako tries to slam it, but Chie steps in further.

"I'm not lying," Chie says. She's still holding her hand out. "Not if you come with me."

* * *

(What is a cannibal, Nanako asked her big brother a few weeks ago.

Well, now she knows.)

* * *

Chie feels like a total creep. Nanako walks just ahead of both Chie and Yukiko, so at least Nanako thinks both of them are terrible people. Chie feels like throwing up again. Yukiko doesn't look bothered, but this whole thing is Yukiko's idea to begin with.

And that's the thing. It was Yukiko's idea. Not Yosuke's, which—it would've been awful, but not so surprising. Yosuke's been—changed by all of this, and Souji—maybe, maybe not. And as for Yukiko—

Chie's just bullied a little girl into a TV, so if Yukiko's changed, then at least she's changed with her.

There are police cars pulled into the Junes parking lot in a furtive spot, and people with guns inside. There aren't any shoppers inside. Chie holds onto Nanako's hand, because Nanako won't take Yukiko's. They're walking into a trap, but to go into a TV they've never been through, especially without Rise to guide them.

"Do you see anyone?" Yukiko says, trying to not move her head too much as they walk to the elevator. The security cameras seem to be trained on them. Maybe they are. Who knows if Shirogane's relationship with the police is as bad as it seems. If it is, then they'll be okay, but if not…

"I see someone looking at the dishes."

Yukiko has her thinking look on. "Junes does have a nice silverware deal right now."

Chie kind of feels like that's beside the point. Silverware? Now?

"Don't worry," Yukiko says, and strokes Chie's hair. They enter the elevator. "We have Nanako-chan."

There's a moment where Chie's entire body stiffens, like it's suddenly gotten cold, but her neck and the back of her head feel like they're going to burst into flame. The door closes. Chie tries to pretend that there wasn't a policeman with a walkie-talkie in the corner.

"This is crazy," Chie says. "I mean, this is really crazy."

"Are you sick?" Yukiko says, pressing the button to the second floor.

"What do you think?" Chie says. She gestures to Nanako, who doesn't look happy with… well, any of this, and then she looks at the security camera, which caught the whole Shirogane thing.

"Maybe this really is the end," Yukiko says.

"Don't say that," Chie says. "We're definitely going to make it."

"Maybe."

"You're so—" Chie feels the urge to grab Yukiko, shake, pull her into and—but there's Nanako right there, and the elevator dings as they arrive. There's Adachi in the electronics department, near the TVs. He's waiting for them, leaning against a box with a long, hard smile.

"Hey, Satonaka-san," he says. "Nanako-chan. Amagi-san."

Nanako doesn't look like she wants to be near Adachi anymore than she wants to be around Yukiko or Chie.

"What do you want?" Chie says.

"Haha," Adachi says. "Just a quick conversation, that's all." He's looking at them, like he's considering something. Then he says, "Who thought it would've been you kids, huh."

They're going to have to get rid of Adachi, somehow. Chie feels her head get light.

"You don't have to worry," Adachi says. "I've come alone. Just me."

"So what's with all the officers?" Chie says.

"Well," Adachi says. "They're just there in case things get nasty. C'mon. We got the tapes. First Shirogane and now Dojima-san's girl? You guys pull a mean game."

Chie holds onto Nanako's hand a little tighter. Yukiko steps forward.

"We haven't done anything," Yukiko says.

"Haha," Adachi says. "Where are you girls going?"

"It isn't any of your business," says Yukiko says, all stiff and proper and with a hint of steel.

"Come on, Amagi-san, don't resist it," Adachi says. "You're outnumbered."

"Not here," Chie says. She pushes Nanako forward to Yukiko. "And not right now."

"Yeah?" Adachi says. "You know, I don't even feel sorry for you anymore. Don't make trouble."

Yeah, whatever. She's eaten. She feels fine. She jumps forward, and Adachi draws his gun—she kicks it out of his hand, and spin kicks his head. He staggers, falls forward, then grabs onto the edge of a TV and tosses it onto the ground. It breaks onto the ground with a smash.

"Don't just stand there!" Chie says to Yukiko. "You have to get Nanako-chan to safety!"

"Right," Yukiko says, grabbing onto Nanako. Chie wants to say something else—maybe something like, 'I'll be there soon,' but then Adachi grab her chest with his hands and twists. He's mostly holding onto her uniform, but the pain still jolts her like a shock. She bashes her head against his nose, and like an idiot, hits him with her forehead. Even when he drops to the ground, she's tempted to fall over and grab her head, too. She knees him in the face, and then hits him again—his head bends into her bones, and she pretends to not feel it.

She lets him fall. Yukiko is there to catch her when her legs go weak.

"Nanako-chan," Chie says.

"I already put her in," Yukiko says. It sounds a little surreal coming from her mouth. She looks down at Adachi, and then draws in a deep breath. "He's still alive. I think."

"Right," Chie says. They don't kill people unless it's absolutely necessary, and even then, Souji's the one who picks the targets—she doesn't know how, and doesn't want to know how. She's relieved that Adachi's still alive.

"We should get rid of him," Yukiko says.

"But that'll make us—"

"Murderers?"

Well, there's that. "Cop-killers."

Yukiko doesn't even blink. But her brow furrows in a familiar way. "Are detectives cops?"

"Yukiko," Chie says. She's tired and doesn't want to think like this.

"I'm sorry," Yukiko says. "It's just—" There's a pop, and then Yukiko falls forward, clutching at her chest. There's blood—Chie knows that smell too well—and then something hot splashes onto Chie's skin. Adachi's standing, gun still pointed at Yukiko; his face, bloody and broken, is livid. There's another shot, and Chie feels something hot strike her shoulder. She grabs Yukiko and pulls her to their TV. There are a few more shots of the gun, which make Yukiko flinch, but the bullets miss their mark. Chie knocks over some other TVs to provide a screen. They make it to their TV without taking any more hits.

"You should go first," Yukiko says.

"No, you should," Chie says.

"You have to promise that you'll come with me at the same time," Yukiko says. "No heroics, Chie. If something were to happen to you, I don't know what I'd do, Chie, if you—"

"Okay," Chie says, because she needs Yukiko to stop talking before the detective's bullet ends up in her head. "I promise."

"Okay," Yukiko says. "Good."

She has a pretty smile. Chie finds herself smiling back. They reach into the TV with their hands, and Chie knows she promised, but she has to make sure Yukiko makes it safely. The last thing she sees before everything goes black is Yukiko turning back to look at her, eyes wide.


	7. devour(the shadow remix)

Halfway to wherever Teddie's taking them, Teddie breaks away and runs back to the entrance. Yosuke thinks it's the entrance—there are barely any paths around here. Teddie charges like some crazy out of control dog. Kanji's not good enough with lightning spells to hit him half the time, and before long he's back in his human form, wheezing and panting.

"Shit," he says. "One of you can get him."

It's Yosuke who ends up being the one who tackles Teddie down. Teddie swipes him with those giant claws, same place as before, but this time he knows Yukiko's fast behind him. He smashes Teddie's face, or means to. His hand goes through dark, shadowy space instead. Teddie cries and weeps, just as though he's been hit.

They try to pull Teddie back to the right path, but he keeps growling and yanking his way back to the entrance. "Stupid bear," Yosuke says. "Guess we're going to put you down after all." Teddie doesn't respond to it, just yanks and heads away from the original trail.

They figure it out soon enough when Rise emerges from the mists. Teddie's practically slobbering by then. He's running and gaining speed. They all move at once, lightning, fire, and wind smashing down on Teddie. Teddie turns back on them, breathing heavy, and roars; but Kanji's on top of him soon enough, beating him down. Rise watches it all with an almost shocked expression. Then she says, "Go, Kanji-kun!"

"Yo, Rise-chan," Yosuke says. He steps aside to watch Take-Mikazuchi grapple with Teddie. Teddie's madder than he's ever seen him, straining towards Rise as though she's taken something from him. He howls and weeps, scratches the floor with his claws and bares his teeth. His eyes drip; he looks to Yosuke, then Yukiko, then back to Rise. Take-Mikazuchi with its giant skull face clacks its teeth.

* * *

The bathhouse is closest. They lock Teddie there and keep going. Yosuke thinks: was he looking at me when we were leaving? Can't be—there isn't anything there anymore. Nothing but a monster.

From there, Rise points them to their next destination, back the way they came and then some. Rise tells them they're all famous on the other side now. "There were these dramatic reports on TV about the Inaba Five," she says.

"Five?" Kanji says.

"The senpai and you," Rise says. "Adachi-san and Naoto-kun didn't suspect me. Not until now."

"Shirogane's still alive?" Yosuke says. He tries to look casual about it, but he thinks Rise might have sensed something. He looks over his shoulder, to the shadowy silhouette, and ends up making eye contact with Yukiko. He scowls, and turns back.

"Maybe he'll help us," Kanji says. In the conspicuous silence, he says, "What? Isn't like it's impossible."

"I wonder what his shadow will be like," Yukiko says. It's the first thing she's said in a while. "If he ever comes back. We've never seen what happens if you don't confront it."

"Maybe he'll go berserk and kill everyone," Yosuke says. Privately, he's worried about Souji. What'll happen if they have to fight him.

They keep moving.

Rise tracks Souji down to a path that looks more familiar than it should: it's the shopping district of Inaba covered in white fog, the smell of blood and water everywhere.

When they step through the portal, he registers the room first, the boxes everywhere, the shelves stacked with dusty green-glass bottles and boxes of beer. It's the Konishi's shop, where Saki died. Beyond all that, he sees Souji, Souji sitting on the floor in the middle of the shop, Souji sitting there with his collar popped and hair flat down on his forehead.

He raises his hand and says, "Hi guys."

* * *

Yosuke's the one who tells Souji what's been going on. Their cover. Naoto. Chie. He and Souji talk it out in a corner of the room, Souji on a low stool with his feet on the floor and hands between his legs, Yosuke leaning against the wall. Their feet are close. The others mill around, inspect the room, sniff at the beer and wine.

Souji listens to everything he says with a nod. Then he says, "That's a pity. For all of them."

"Can I tell you something?" Yosuke says. Souji nods. His eyebrows push together, like he's really concerned. Yosuke feels a warm flush go through him, like something's unknotting in him, something that's been clumped up inside him since Adachi showed up at his door. "I'm the one who infected Naoto."

"Ah," Souji says.

"'Ah'?" Yosuke says. "Come on. That's worth more than one 'ah.'"

Souji shrugs. He looks tired. He said to them all earlier he doesn't have a Shadow because he already has a Persona—but it's an eerie thing, to see a man with no Shadow. You never know which way he stands when the light hits him. Whether his shadow will fall behind him, or lie in a pooling darkness beneath his feet.

"It only matters if you feel something," Souji says. "Or if you care."

"Easy for you to say."

"It is easy for me."

"That's just because you're a perfect jerk," he says, his smile tight at the edge of his lips.

"I put a lot of effort into being one." Souji rubs the underside of his chin with his thumb. "How's Nanako?"

"Dunno." Souji frowns. Yosuke reaches over and squeezes Souji's shoulder. "Hey," he says. "She's going to be okay."

"I just wish you had asked me first. I wish you guys never thought of exchanging hostages. I wanted to get rid of Shirogane, but that's the only reason you'd take someone into that world…" His gaze rest on Yukiko. It's calm, without anger; but his mouth tugs down sharply, before straightening out again. "Whatever. You're right. It'll be okay." He stands up and nods over to the corner of the room. The way he's looking at Yosuke, it's clear he wants Yosuke to go away.

"Come on," Yosuke says.

"Just go over there so they don't think we're still talking."

"God!" he says, but goes anyway. It's not far from where his Shadow first appeared.

It's true, though. Now that he's gone, everyone's paying attention to Souji. Souji does one of his soft smiles and says, "I think we're close to wrapping this up."

"Really?" Kanji says, his whole face lighting up. "You think so, senpai?"

"Yes," Souji says. "Look at where we are. It's the Konishi liquor store."

"Yeah?" Yosuke says.

"It just seemed odd to me. Every TV has a place tied to it. So if I came through here, it means the TV I went through was the same one Saki Konishi-san went through." And the TV Souji went through was in the police department. Yosuke watches everyone figure it out.

"Then," Kanji says, halting. "Who is it?"

Souji shrugs. "I don't think any of us here think Adachi-san is innocent. Not after what he did to Chie-san and Rise-chan. He's always given us a bad vibe. If we take out Adachi-san, then between him and what Shirogane-kun is going through, that'll be enough to knock the investigation off our trail for a while. All we'll need to do is talk to Adachi-san. Then we go. Leave Inaba for good." He smiles at all of them, grim. "Let's go home."


	8. devour(the demon remix)

Rise finds them a portal to the outside world that takes them to one of the farmhouses in Inaba. It belongs to a single old man, Shinozaki-san. Shinozaki's still out in the rice paddies when they arrive; but Souji draws a line across his throat, and sends Kanji and Yosuke after him.

"Why can't you take a fucking vacation?" Kanji says as he whales on the old man. He's crying as he punches him, over and over. "I told you before, you're working too hard—you should've moved in with your daughter, you fucking old man!"

When it's done, Kanji has to take a moment to crouch on the path and sniffle.

"Fucking sucks," he says. "Bet he would've let us hide with him if we asked."

"No, he would've turned us into the police," Yosuke says. "And then we'd never get Adachi. So suck up."

"We don't even know if Adachi did it."

It's true, but Yosuke hates that it's Kanji who's doubting them. He always does it like this: the worst thing to say at the worst time to say it. Just enough to make Yosuke feel like everything they're doing is pointless. He scowls at Kanji and says, "Just shut up, man. Okay? No one needs you getting all Debbie Downer on us." He turns Shinozaki's head with the heel of his shoe, so the entire left side of his face goes under the shallow water. Blood darkens the water. "Let's take this in," Yosuke says. "Bet Souji's starving."

"Shit," Kanji says, disgusted. "Can't believe what's happened to us."

* * *

It starts to rain in the early evening, first a gray drizzle, then an unforgiving downpour. Souji decides they should go out then.

"Adachi-san works eight-seven every day," Souji says. "Later, depending on how busy he is. Every evening he stops by the 7-11 near his house for dinner. I don't think he knows how to cook. He'll be there tonight, I bet. Kanji-kun, Yosuke, and Yukiko-san will catch him and bring him back here. Rise-chan and I will stay here."

"Why her?" Yosuke says, loudly. He'd rather have Souji there.

"Because she can't fight. It'd be dumb to let her go."

"Not like Yukiko-san's any better up close," Yosuke says. "No offense."

"It's all right, Yosuke-kun," Yukiko says. "I want to go."

"You see?" Souji says. "Just go."

There are two bikes in Shinozaki's shed. Yukiko rides with Kanji. She holds an umbrella for him as they bike down the lone farm road to the shopping district, then further out to the 7-11. It has two glass walls, frosted to about waist-height, and clear the rest of the way. One of the glass walls looks out to the five car parking lot attached to the side. Across the street from the parking lot is a closed down shop. They hide in the alley between that shop and a furniture store closed for the day. She has to abandon the umbrella. Too visible, she says.

"Should've thought about that before you came out here in all red," Yosuke says.

"It's not like there was a change of clothes on hand," she says. The rain's divided her hair into black strings, and her headband keeps slipping over her forehead. "You've been grouchy ever since we got in the TV. Do you need a nap?"

"Screw you."

"Wish I had my crackers on me," Kanji says. "The cute lions always made me feel better. Just one pop in my mouth and I'd feel great."

Someone's approaching. They all pull back into the alleyway, hold their breaths. When the person passes, they release the breath they're holding. They wait like that for what feels like hours in the tersest silence Yosuke's ever sat through. By the time Adachi actually shows up in his car, he's almost ready to just march up to him and sock him in the jaw, ethics be damned; the only thing stopping him is Shirogane, pale and small from illness and bleary featured from the rain running down the window, in Adachi's car. Adachi's browsing magazines and staring up at the TV. They watch Adachi for a while, mesmerized. A few weeks ago that could have been them—hell, a few days ago. Scavenging the 7-11 for food after school, looking at magazines, walking around a shop without fearing someone might try to gun them down on the streets. The way the rain on the glass windows make Adachi seem like smeared, wet paint only makes it hurt more, until it's like a stabbing tooth.

After a moment Yukiko says, "I want Adachi."

"You should let me and Kanji do it," Yosuke says. "No offense, but you aren't exactly going to strike fear in the hearts of men everywhere."

"Nah," Kanji says. "Let her go. I want to talk with Shirogane, anyway. Figure we're friendly, you know?"

"That's a word for it," Yosuke says.

"I'm telling you. He'll help us."

"Sure," Yosuke says. "Just walk up to him and say 'what's up, want to suck my dick?'" Kanji's fists go tight. Yosuke says quickly, "I was just joking. I bet you'll be good. You know?"

"You need serious therapy, senpai," Kanji says. "I mean it. Or maybe _you_ should try blowing someone. Bet that'd plug up all that shit you got coming out of your mouth. I'll go first. Yukiko-senpai, can you keep Adachi-san busy while I talk with Shirogane?"

"He'll be busy," Yukiko says, reaching for her umbrella.

"Yeah," Kanji says. He nods his head, and takes off into the rain, for Adachi's car.

Yukiko picks up the umbrella, and pops it open.

"Thought you said that'd be too visible," Yosuke says, then actually looks at the umbrella. She's taped a fucking knife to the long handle. "Holy shit!"

"Sorry?" Yukiko says. Incredibly, she sounds surprised by his shock. "I didn't plan on bringing Adachi-san back alive."

"Well, _I do_! Souji wants him back alive, too." Yosuke stares at her. She's standing at the mouth of the alleyway, lit up from behind by the greenish light from the 7-11. It makes her look garish, like a bloody Christmas tree. He takes a breath. "If you kill him, we'll never get a confession out of him. If we get him to confess, then…" Even he knows it sounds nuts. It'll never happen. He should know this by now.

"He killed Chie," Yukiko says, drawing the knife closer to her body, like she's afraid he'll make the mistake of lunging for it.

"I know! I know." But he's wigging out. Eating people because they're demons and need to eat, fine. But murder—what makes it different? Maybe the only difference is her pain. Justice for one versus justice for all. Souji must have known Yukiko would want to kill Adachi like this. Did Souji even want Adachi back alive at all? He feels like he needs to laugh.

"I'm going," Yukiko says, turning.

"No! No, wait." He grabs her by the arm and pulls her back into the alley. Through the glass wall of the 7-11, he can see Adachi with the cashier. "Look," he says, but nothing else comes out. You can't. Chie wouldn't want it. You can't. We only kill people to eat. You can't. Going down the crazy ax-murder path was supposed to be for him. Like he has some kind of special providence on self-pity and despair, like he's the only one who's allowed to feel like they've reached the end of it. It's that feeling, that entitlement that makes him such a switch, unbearably cynical one moment, then saying no, no, you can't the next.

Look at me! some part of him shouts. It hurts. It hurts. Notice me: my pain, my hopelessness, my patheticness. Oh, god, someone, care about me. And there's the other part of him who can see his friend tunneling into herself with grief, and feels pity for her and has sorrow for her and with her. Shit, he thinks. I'm so fucked up. Just be one or the other, dickwad, don't go from one to the other. Be a man or be a demon—just pick one!

He sees this with perfect clarity just for a moment. Then he is in the rain, soaked and dry mouthed, the moment escaping into the broken lines of light on the pavement, into the puddles on the sidewalk, into the drops of rain dripping off his arms and face. "You can't," is all he can say. "You can't."

She bolts, running through the wet pavement with her wet shoes. He chases her, manages to tackle her before she can reach the shop. Adachi is waiting for the cashier to pack up his stuff. She elbows him, gets him good right in the neck.

Adachi is leaving the store. He sees them: Yukiko stumbling to her feet, Yosuke flat on the ground. His gaze is dumb without recognition. The twin bags of groceries hang from his two hands like two taffy moons. Yukiko is charging at him; Yosuke is getting up; Adachi sees who his killer is; Yukiko drives the knife into his gut, then pulls it back and drives it into his eye. The screaming stops then, then starts again, this time from inside the 7-11.

She falls with Adachi, her knees hitting the pavement with the canned vegetables and discounted boxed lunch and rolls of curry bread. She stabs him two more times before she drops the knife. She gasps as she stares at Adachi's face.

Yosuke crouches down beside her. He stares at her. "You okay?" he says. She doesn't say anything, just pants, open-mouthed. There's blood in the water, blood on her dress, blood on her face, blood on the glass window and door. He picks up the knife and stands up. The cashier is still screaming. "Hey," he says. "I'm going to do clean up. I'll be back right after."

He heads into the 7-11. It's so clean: no fog, no rain. All the magazines in order. Food everywhere. The cashier is an old forty-something woman, too scared to even cry. He feels simultaneously furious at this woman for making him kill her, and sad that he'll have to kill her—then he wonders, why kill her at all? He isn't hungry. After this they're going to jump into a TV and reappear somewhere else. Hokkaido or Fukuoka or Okinawa or something. Let her go home to her kids or her husband or her girlfriend or whatever. Let her live.

He picks up some bread and a couple of magazines and newspapers.

"Ring these up for me," he says, dumping it all on the counter. When she shakes and quivers, he says, "Come on! I don't have all day."

She's shaking the whole time. She bags it all for him—he's pretty sure it's just to avoid his eyes. He reaches for his wallet, but he can't find it. Shit. He must have left it behind at Shinozaki's house.

"Crap!" he says. "I'm an idiot. I'm really sorry about it—"

"Please," she says. "Please." _Don't kill me,_ she must be saying. Or worse, don't eat me.

"You see, we can be nice sometimes. Thanks."

From the parking lot comes two flashes of light and two cracks that could be mistaken for thunder. Yosuke takes his stuff and calmly exits the 7-11. Yukiko is holding onto Adachi's body with a weird calmness. There are another two gunshots from the parking lot.

"Kanji-kun," Yukiko says. She turns Adachi over on the sidewalk.

"Shit," Yosuke says. "That faggot. I didn't think he'd fuck it up."

"Yosuke-kun," she says.

"It's his own fault," Yosuke says. He runs a hand through his hair, then says, "We're going to need to bring Shirogane alive, aren't we. Goddamn it."

* * *

Kanji, Yosuke, and Yukiko left on bikes, but it's only Yosuke and Yukiko who return in Adachi's car. There are three bodies, one alive, two dead: Kanji without half of his head and blood all over his chest, Adachi without a face and his neck cut wide open. Shirogane, at least, is just unconscious.

"I didn't know you knew how to drive," Souji says to Yosuke.

"Dad's been giving me lessons. First time driving in the rain, though. Ha! We could've died out there," he says. He has a wild look in his eyes from exhaustion or hysteria. Yukiko, in the passenger's seat, just looks like she's in the middle of an asthma attack. That's how hard she's crying. Well, Souji figures. She had to start eventually.

"You should get some rest," Souji says. "Yukiko-san, too. Once she's stopped crying, you can put her with Rise-chan in the living room. You can take the spare bedroom."

Yosuke nods. His eyes are lidded in thought or exhaustion. There's blood on his shirt and face. It's sexy, in a way. Souji squeezes Yosuke's shoulder, not knowing what to say. _Good work_ sounds too callous. _Welcome back_ like one of those movie phrases.

"Is it going to be over once you've killed Shirogane?" Yosuke says.

"I'm not planning on killing Shirogane-kun." He would have gone himself, if he wanted to off Shirogane. He can see the angry, 'so what are you planning on doing' on Yosuke's face already. Souji wipes some of the blood off Yosuke's cheek and says, "I figure it'll be good if he and I have a talk. Then—then I guess we'll see."

"Ah," he says, in a way that sounds like a sigh, or the beginning of a lament. Ah, God, why have you abandoned me? One of those kinds of 'ahs,' or something like it.


	9. devour(the king remix)

When Yukiko wakes up, it's early morning. She's in someone's living room, on their couch. Rise is watching TV and snacking on some meat gamely.

"Hi, senpai," she says. She smells fresh, clean of both gore and the grimy buildup of skin and dust. When Yukiko sniffs a little harder, she can tell Rise has showered recently. Within the last three hours, she thinks. Rise turns the plate over to her and says, "Want some?"

It's strips of meat, hacked from the flesh with what must have been a dull knife. She takes a piece and eats it, even though she's not hungry. Unexpectedly, she feels her stomach heave. She eats anyway.

"Are you feeling okay?" Rise says.

"Yes," she says, as unbelievable as that is to say. She stands up and straightens out her cardigan and shirt and skirt. Everything's wrinkled from the rain and from her—sleep? Her nap? She feels as though she had the strangest dream, but she can't remember what it was. Coconuts? It definitely involved coconuts.

It's just her and Rise in the room, although Kanji's shirt is there, folded up neatly and bloody. She can smell Yosuke in the house, and Souji, too. And someone else. One more loose end, one more body. Yukiko looks up and says, "Where is Shirogane?"

* * *

Shirogane wakes up at dawn. Souji wakes, too, then. He wasn't sleeping, just dozing, but for a moment he has no idea what's happened or what's going on.

Shirogane is handcuffed to the bedpost, both of his hands extended over his head and around the head struts of the bed frame, the rest of his body left alone. To begin with, Shirogane's too short for Souji to have tied his ankles at the other end of the bed. He doesn't want to give Shirogane the wrong impression, either, of why he's been tied up like this. Souji can smell the fear and that's enough for him. There's nothing else he needs.

A few minutes tick by. Souji knocks on Yosuke's door in the guest room and asks for food. Two plates, he says. One for him and his guest. Yosuke's back a few minutes later with some belly meat and Adachi's hand. He looks tired and angry. No one likes eating hands, Souji thinks, but takes it anyway.

"Whatever," Yosuke says and goes back to the guest room. Presumably to sleep.

Souji puts the plates on the bed. He'll leave the belly meat for Shirogane. The hand—well. He guesses Yosuke's mad at him. He pulls up a wooden chair up to Shirogane's bedside and sets to work. He sees Shirogane stiffen and grow rigid. He stops eating and says, because he doesn't really like eating hands any more than he likes chicken feet, "I thought you'd be less cooperative."

Shirogane says nothing. His eyes are fixed on the window, as though he's trying to tell the time, but the room they're in faces the north. The sunlight will remain as defeated as it is now for hours. Souji, after a moment, takes off Shirogane's hat and puts it on his own head.

"Give that back," Shirogane says.

"Sentimental value?" Souji says. He takes the hat off and twirls it in his hands. Of course this is what gets Shirogane to talk. He should have guessed. All those affectations are just barriers and mirages. Clothes are not just identity for some people, but armor. A poor sort of armor, if you must strip out of it every night and climb back into it in the morning. And look: this won't even save you from a stick, never mind a knife. "Did this belong to your father? Your uncle? A grandfather?"

"It's mine," Shirogane says. "You have no right to do this to me. You are nothing but a murderer, a cannibal and a demon, and you are assaulting a man of the law, and you have no right."

"You're not a man of the law. You're a consultant. A private citizen." Souji holds up Shinozaki's hand, with its missing two fingers, and snaps the middle finger off. "So that's one part where you are wrong. And as for your first point, you're right. I don't have a right to do this." He wraps his hand around the index finger. "And we're both murderers and cannibals and demons, so." He snaps off the finger and tosses both of them away. He puts what's left of the hand on Shirogane's chest.

Shirogane closes his eyes when Souji snaps off the fingers. He flinches, too, when Souji breaks off the fingers. Now he turns his head to the side and glares. His bangs fall away from his face. The demon's mark burns on his forehead, right above his temple.

"It was not murder. He approached me with unknown intentions. I warned him to stay away. I told him to stay, but he lunged. It was in self-defense."

"Kanji-kun?" Souji says. "No. He's too kind. He meant to be your friend. You know that."

Improbable as it is, Shirogane sniffles. For himself, or for Kanji. Souji looks away politely, then says, "You can still make amends."

"Excuse me?"

"Think about it. Kanji-kun's death, Adachi-san's death, Chie-san's death, my sister's kidnapping, all of those would never have happened if you had stayed away from this case. If you had been less dogged, if you had the sense to back away, then none of this would have to happen."

"And let you continue killing as you wished?" Shirogane says, his eyebrows rising with increasing incredulity. "You cannot—you are not seriously saying that _I_ am the one at fault for this chain of events. You're the one who became cannibals on what I can only describe as a lark. If _you_ had never existed, then none of this would have started. Why are you keeping me here?"

"I wanted to be flattered."

Shirogane spits at him in disgust.

"Dojima-san showed me the profile you made of me," Souji says. "The one where you said I was clever. A natural-born leader but repressing those qualities in order to take on a nurturing profession. How the pent up aggression caused me to go berserk. I always wished you had published that one."

"Go on. Laugh. You must have laughed when you read it. No—I'm certain of it." Shirogane takes a deep breath. He seems to retch, but manages to contain himself. The hand rocks back and forth on his chest. "I knew you had to be clever to evade the police; you had to be clever, charismatic, and coldhearted. You thought that doing this made you better than other people. And you are. Stronger and smarter than all the rest of them—but you're not even half as human as the people you killed."

"Don't trot out those sorry pieces of rhetoric," he says. "There's nothing inhuman about doing what you must to survive. War, famine, floods. All of those things make men do worse. Human nature encompasses nearly everything. I know there's a part of you that agrees."

Shirogane jerks his hands forward. The handcuffs stop them. The whole bed rattles. What's the word he wants to say? Something like, 'I'm not you,' Souji bets. They always say that as they struggle with their demon, but in the end the hunger is always theirs. Their pain, their anguish, have always belonged to them.

Souji puts a hand on Shirogane's shoulder. "Join us," he says. He snaps his hand away when Shirogane tries to bite him. Adachi's hand rolls off his chest and lands on the bed. "You'll need our help sooner or later. Soon, I think. You're getting hungry."

He thrashes against the handcuffs again, snarls. "I'd never join you. You're trying to trick me, the way you convinced the others. You murderer. You can't trick me like you can trick the others. You're slime. The second I met you, I knew you were involved." He spits again. It lands on Souji's leg, a slow, wet spot. Souji wipes most of it onto the floor. He's still holding the hat. "You aren't going to kill me. You need me to feed your ego. So why am I here? You need to gloat. If you're going to die, then why not violate me while you're—"

"No one is going to die. You don't understand." He's keeping Shirogane alive because Shirogane has the demon now, too; because that hunger is better directed than not. Because their numbers are growing thin and it's stressing everyone out. Because Shirogane has skills that will be useful, and he has contacts and money. And he's someone who needs protection. The kind of boy whose vulnerabilities are like lances. "This is your last chance," he says, meaning: _after this, you'll never see us again. We'll disappear. Then who will be there to help you?_

But Shirogane takes it as a threat. He spits again and twists his body against his handcuffs. Both plates fall off the bed and crash. His face goes pale as chalk, then turns, gradually, red. Souji gets up then. Time to go.

"I'll find you," Shirogane shouts at his back. "As long as you're alive, I'll find you. You don't know what a mistake it was keeping me alive here and telling me so much. Now you'll never escape me. Six months from now you'll be sitting in jail. You should pray you will be in jail. All of Japan will be against you. There's nowhere you can go where you won't have to look over your shoulder, watching—"

Souji closes the door behind him. He sighs. He feels old.

* * *

For a while he stays in that hallway. He's debating whether he should go back inside and beat Shirogane until that pretty face of his is swollen with blood and all his teeth are rattling somewhere in his stomach. That guy's a fucking pain in the ass. As though killing someone makes him any different from anyone else. The only difference is that he had to, and he was good at it long enough to make a big mess of things when everything came out. And he's so tired.

Well, here's where he is now. He feels the demon's mark burn on the back of his neck, and smiles to himself. He closes his eyes. He should have asked how Nanako is doing, because he does feel bad about her and Dojima, and what all this will do to them. Oh well, he thinks. Time to head downstairs and make sure Yukiko isn't going to try to starve herself.

Yosuke is leaning against the stair railing, staring at the wall and the blank, gaping opening leading to the first floor.

"Hey," Souji says, leaning on the railing, too.

It takes Yosuke a moment to say it, but he does, eventually. "Yo."

"How are you?"

"It's nothing. I was just thinking," Yosuke says, in a way that no one who's feeling fine ever says. "That's all."

Souji touches Yosuke's arm, and leads him back into the guest room. It smells—well, he's just going to be honest here, it smells like Shinozaki hasn't changed the bed sheets in months. It smells like five or six different people have been here decades apart from one another, each leaving their own queer imprint on the walls, in the air, on the sheets. And the wallpaper's peeling. He's never been in a house with so many spiders in it before.

Yosuke tugs the curtains shut and sits on the bed. After a moment, Souji sits, too.

"It's about Saki-senpai," Yosuke says. "Dumb, I know."

"No." But he kind of thinks it is.

"When we started all, this." Yosuke gestures helplessly at the wall, where their shadows are stretched against the wallpaper. "You said you'd help me catch Saki-senpai's killer. But we're leaving Inaba now, so. It just made me realize something."

He waits. Then he says, "Keep going."

"If I had known all this was going to happen, then I wouldn't have gone into the TV." He braces his hands against his knees and laughs. "Pretty terrible of me, right? It just seems crazy—we did all that stuff because I had to, I just had to go into the TV."

"Yosuke, who even thinks of the kinds of things we got into?" Souji says. "What should we have done? Killed ourselves? It's true that we probably won't find the murderer, but we're still alive. As long as we're still alive, we'll always have a chance to move on."

Yosuke scoffs. Rolls his eyes. Turns his head to the side, then looks back to Souji. They're closer than they were before, Souji realizes, because of the way the bed's bending them. "Tell that to Yukiko-san."

"I will," he says. But he doesn't move. He's always liked Yosuke's face, but the last few months have carved him out, made him rangy and scared. It's only the last few days that they've been able to eat as much as they want. It's not like they're having fun doing it or anything—even so, being full looks good on Yosuke, too. His skin is less gray, his body less tense. He looks better.

"Come on," Yosuke says, shoving Souji harder than he has to. Souji almost topples over. He catches himself with his elbow and straightens back up. "Come on, go tell her. Unless you're full of crap."

"Yosuke."

"What?" Yosuke says, and shoves Souji over again.

There's a time and place for telling people everything's going to be all right. Now's not the right time for her. Not now, but maybe—maybe a week from now. Maybe when they've run off to somewhere, some tiny island by the sea where all—all four of them, that's right. When the four of them, him and Yosuke, Rise and Yukiko, can sit by the sea and relax. When the thought of people crying doesn't make him want to roll his eyes. These are the people who will be with him for the rest of their lives, and for the rest of his. Well, that's a lot of words. It's true enough, he figures, but the truth is, he's hungry and lonely and tired.

So he says, "You're right. I am full of crap."

Yosuke laughs, flustered. He moves backwards, moves like he's about to stand up. Souji sits up, grabs Yosuke by the arm, puts his other hand against his thigh, and pushes him down.

"Dude," Yosuke says. His ears are red. "Dude. I'm not. I mean, not really. Not like Kanji or, Chie, or something. You keep blowing me off, anyway. What's the big deal?"

"You're the one who keeps blowing me off. It's always, 'Kanji's a fag' or 'wow, can you believe those dykes.'" Yosuke flinches at that. Good. "I'm not—I want a kiss, okay?"

"Come on," Yosuke says, but he's not looking away. He doesn't look like he's going to run away, either. Souji draws him in closer and kisses him. There's a harrowing moment where Yosuke goes stiff, a moment where the kiss goes completely awful while Yosuke tries to figure out what to do and how hard he should panic. Then Yosuke pulls back, takes a deep breath, and shuts his eyes.

This time he's the one who starts, lips puckered like he's about to kiss his aunt. Souji takes him by the chin, tilts his head to the side, and this time it goes better. Yosuke's lips are hot and his breath is as hot as the summer outside. He's breathing harshly through his nose, an unpleasant sound that turns into a squeak when Souji runs his knuckles along Yosuke's stomach. That's as good a time as any to slip him some tongue. Yosuke falls backwards onto the bed. Souji goes down with him.

"Oh my god," Yosuke says, at the fifth kiss. At that point his shirt's unbuttoned. It's wrinkly and stiff from the rain and from being slept on. It doesn't look that warm, either. "Oh, geeze, oh, man."

"What?" Souji says.

"I'm—shit. I think—can you get up?"

"Are you hard?"

"No! Who asks that?"

Souji moves a bit, and… He doesn't blink. He instead moves his hand down and undoes the button and fly. Yosuke's red at this point. Souji pushes his pants down, just the waistband. Yosuke tugs them down further. Souji rubs at his hip. He doesn't let his hands go down further.

"What about you?" Yosuke says. He's squirming, his eyes going everywhere. "Come on. What about you?"

"I'm a little stressed out at the moment," he says, doing his best to not say: Two of our friends are dead, two bodies cut up in the kitchen, an angry detective next door—and you want a dick in your ass _now_? He smiles through it and lets his wrist brush Yosuke's cock, straining beneath the underwear. "What do you want?"

Someone knocks on the door then. Souji gets up. Yosuke bites into his fist, swears, then turns around to make himself presentable again.

It's Yukiko. Discrete as always, she says, "Rise says they're doing a door-to-door search."

"Okay," Souji says. "Yosuke, meet us downstairs when you're ready. Don't take too long."

"Right," Yosuke says. "Right!"

There's no awkwardness as they head back down except for a moment when Yukiko looks at the room Shirogane's been locked in. For a moment he thinks she's going to ask about what they're going to do to him. Instead she lets her gaze slide away.

Rise is sitting next to the TV, half in Himiko. When they come down, she releases the transformation and says, "They're a kilometer away. Senpai, are we going to clean things up?"

He looks to the kitchen, dripping with blood. Too much of a bother. And Adachi doesn't deserve it, anyway. "No."

Rise grins and says, "Where's Yosuke-senpai?"

"Probably blowing off some steam."

She giggles at that, and rubs his back.

Yukiko is staring out a window, one of the clean ones. She has a distant but open expression on her face. Not confused, not angry, not worried, just—open.

"Yukiko-san," he says. 'Stop looking out the window like that,' he almost says. Instead he ends up with, "It'll be all right. I know it will be."

He doesn't expect her to say anything, but she looks up at him and smiles. "You're right," she says. "It will be."

A good omen if even Yukiko's optimistic.

He sits on the couch while they wait for Yosuke. He's right across from the TV. His face surprises him: the exhaustion visible below his eyes, the set of his jaw, the redness in his lips. A slight asymmetry in the set of his eyes that he's always tried to avoid noticing. Stranger, who are you, sitting sullen in the darkness? The same person you were before, the same man and the same demon.

He was always this person. So stop complaining already and go.


	10. august(the heaven remix)

_2022._

Her journey takes her to Tokyo, then west to Hachioji. The closer she gets to her destination, the thinner the city becomes, glass buildings fading into packed suburbs, then springing back into a city again. From the station she takes a taxi to a quiet, subdued part of the city with a view of the mountains. She digs her fingers into her skirt, then brings them up to her neck to take off her tie. Once she's taken it off, she puts it back on again. The taxi driver, happily, says nothing of it. Aside from asking her where she's headed to at the station, he's paid her no mind: no questions, no knowing glances, no whispering. Of course, he's wearing a hat, so she probably wouldn't be able to tell if he was doing all that.

It's a new experience for her. Her father's never been one for cities, and she spent most of her childhood moving from one small town to another. Nanako's seventeen now, and it's only a few years ago that her father finally moved to somewhere big enough where it took months for people to learn who they were instead of days or weeks. By then people felt pity for them instead of turning and running.

Now it's her turn to do the running. Not away, but towards. She clutches the scrap of address in her hand. She's so nervous she thinks she could hurl.

They arrive at a small electronics repair shop. 'We Fix All Phones,' a new sign in the window reads, along with, "Have A Laptop? Broken Screen? Need Motherboard? Fix Speakers? Ok! No Problem" in English.

"Can you wait for me?" she says. "For the next ten minutes. If I'm not out by then, then you can go."

She's heard things about people in the city: that they're disagreeable, rude, impolite. The taxi driver gives her a thumbs up. His eyes are a terrifying red. "No problem."

She goes into the shop. No one's at the front counter. She reaches into her purse for the bugged phone Shirogane gave her and clutches it. From the back, a man says, "I'll be there in a sec!"

It's longer than a second. It's more like a good five minutes. When the man in the back comes out, she's not sure whether she recognizes him or not. His hair is black, his face is serious. He's wearing a button-up shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and forest green slacks. If she had to guess, she'd say this one's Hanamura, her cousin's right hand man, but there's no way to be sure. He looks much older than twenty-eight. He doesn't look like the pictures of Hanamura, either. That could be from plastic surgery.

"My phone broke," she says.

"Let me take a look." She puts the phone on the counter. He picks it up, presses some buttons, and says, "Do you have an insurance plan?"

"No."

"Okay. That means you're going to have to pay full cost on this if you want to repair it. You get that? I'll give you a quote and then you can decide what you want to do, but I can't give you any fancy discounts." He takes a laptop from under the counter, hooks the phone up to it, and waits for everything to fire up. He taps the phone's screen, then turns it over a few times. "Looks like hardware failure. I won't be able to tell what it is until I open it up."

"That's fine. I have a taxi waiting outside, and…" She gestures.

"You can't stay? I can probably do a diagnostic in fifteen, twenty minutes."

"No, I really need to go. I'm late for—for classes," she says. Do universities have classes now? Her father thinks she's here for a special summer cram school. He will find her corpse in a seedy repair shop, dismembered and half-eaten. What an idiot she is. "Can you e-mail me the quote?"

"Here." He slides his business card over, and a piece of paper. It asks for her name, her number, address, and e-mail. She fills all of them out gamely except for the address. She writes the address of Shirogane's apartment in Yokohama. "Yokohama?"

"That's just where I'm staying for university," she says. "I'm home for the summer."

"Oh, really?" he says, without any suspicion. He's still poking at her phone.

The taxi's still waiting for her. She slides into the vehicle and says, "Take me back to the train station." She slides the business card, carefully, into an evidence bag. She's still trying to swallow her heart.

"All right, honey," the driver says. He lowers his hat over his eyes. "Anything you want."

* * *

It's cold in Shirogane's apartment when she returns. Shirogane is never cold. He says he's been running a fever since his birth. She's been here for a week and she's convinced this apartment is singlehandedly causing global warming.

"Hello?" she says as she takes off her shoes. A moment later, her cellphone rings. She picks it up, exasperated. "It's just me."

"Turn around, please. Not that much, Dojima-san. That's fine. Lower your chin. Now a little more. I'm testing a new camera. You may now move to the living room."

She goes to the living room and sits on the couch.

"Did you see Hanamura there?" he says.

"I don't know. I have his business card. Akira Teshima-san."

"Angle the business card thirty degrees upwards, please."

"If you want to read it so badly, then come get it yourself." She puts the business card on the coffee table and goes to the kitchen to go through the curated collection of takeout menus; all of the menus are new and without stains or creases. She has the impression that Shirogane assembled them just for her. There's money on the island, enough to cover for dinner and her taxi fare.

"I was watching your bank statement," he says.

"Thanks," she says.

She has never actually seen Shirogane in person. He'll only talk to her on the phone or by e-mail. Sometimes he consents to video chat, and even then it's difficult to get a good look at his face. Even now, when he's letting her stay with him, he never appears before her directly. According to the newspapers, Naoto Shirogane left Japan for three years after being disgraced by the Inaba cannibalism case. No one's seen him since his return to Japan. That makes her one of the few people he's shown his face to in the last few years, though she thinks he only showed her because he wants to make her think he trusts him. And also because he's not very good at shaving. His moustache is constantly crooked.

"When you return to the living room, please let me have a better look at the business card."

"Okay." She hangs up, orders dinner, and goes back to the living room. She lets Shirogane get a better look at the business card in the clear evidence bag. Shirogane is going to want these for fingerprints, she knows. He has a whole cache of old evidence.

"I'm going to the bathroom." She hangs up and goes to the bathroom. Shirogane probably has cameras here, too, and she makes a face just for him. She sits on the toilet and checks her phone for e-mails. Just as she thought: Akira Teshima's sent her a quote.

_Dear Dojima-san, The damages were pretty extensive. Here's the list. I've itemized everything. Let me know if you want to go forward._

It doesn't look like he's detected any of Shirogane's bugs. She types the reply Shirogane instructed her to make: _No, I won't need the repairs. I'll come by tomorrow to pick it up._ Meaning, she'll leave it there and never come back. But then she decides: screw this. She's not a coward. She adds: _When should I come, Teshima-san?_

Later that night, she gets a reply.

_Any time is fine._

* * *

She leaves first thing in the morning. It's an hour and a half from Yokohama to Hachioji. More than two hours, factoring in the time it takes to walk and get to the electronics shop by taxi. Shirogane will know she's gone before twenty minutes go by, but by then it'll be too late. She'll be on the subway and on her way out. Anyway, he won't follow her out. He's scared of people. Scared of what? Of—of being ashamed?

Everything that happened with her cousin happened when she was six. Eleven years ago now. Her father was—still is—a police officer. The lead detective on the case. Thanks to Souji, they've had to move from town to town, disgrace swirling them like a persistent fog. It swirled around them, around their legs, their hands, into their nostrils, deep inside their body at the molecular level. So she understands why Shirogane's scared.

_WHAT R U DOING_  
_COME BACK RIGHT NOW DOJIMA-SAN_  
_DOJIMA-SAN THIS IS NOT WHAT WE PLANNED ABORT _  
_NOT PAYING FOR TRAIN+TAXI FARE_

When she tries to think about what Inaba was like, she can't remember. She has a picture of her cousin in her pocket, an old photograph of him and his friends at a Junes table. It's springtime in the picture, sunny and bright with promise. They're all smiling. Their arms are looped around each others' shoulders. How old were they then? Sixteen? Seventeen? She's older than Kanji Tatsumi was when he died. She's older than some of the people he murdered for—for food. Old enough to kill and to be killed.

* * *

The taxi driver's the same man as yesterday, the one with the red eyes and the baseball cap.

"Good morning," he says, winking at her. "Same place as before?"

"Yes," she says.

He opens the door for her, and she slides into the back seat. It smells like he's been eating in the taxi. Something raw. She remembers her cousin against the long night; his jaws growing wide. What's a cannibal, she asked him, and received a lie.

The dumb English signs are in sight. She takes a breath, adjusts her tie, and steps out of the taxi.

"Need me to wait for you, hon?" the driver says.

"No," she says. "Thank you."

She enters the shop. He's already at the counter. Today his pants are black. "Good morning, Dojima-san." He takes out the phone from under the counter and slides it to her. "Here. No charge."

"Thanks." She keeps her eyes on the phone. "Are you from the north, Teshima-san?"

"Nope. Born and raised here."

She takes the picture of her cousin and his friends out and puts it on the counter. "That's you, isn't it?" she says. "This guy in the picture. Hanamura-san."

"No, that's not me. Hanamura? I don't know anyone named Hanamura."

"You are," she says. "I'll call the police if you keep denying it, and they'll—"

Someone enters the shop. "Yo, Teshima-san," he says. His voice—she turns around.

There, black-haired and holding groceries in his arms, is Hanamura. Nanako feels her whole upper body lose its strength, like someone's just aged her to a hundred. Her fingers shake.

"I've locked myself out again," he says. "Do you mind…?"

"Again, Haruki-kun?" Teshima reaches into his pocket, then says, "Left it in the back. One moment." Hanamura stays in the shop with her. He whistles a bit to himself. Nanako thinks her heart's working so fast she's going to faint.

She has to say it. She has to say it now, before Teshima comes back. Hanamura's already noticed her. He's wary and suspicious. She needs to get it out now. "Excuse me. Have you ever lived in Okina City? My father and I are from there. My name is Dojima."

His knuckles go white around his grocery bags.

"Nanako-chan," he says.

* * *

Hanamura and her cousin live above the shop in a small but handsome apartment on the third floor. The floor is hardwood, the furniture is black or glass or both. Hanamura tells her to sit in the living room while he puts the groceries away. She sees vegetables, fresh fruit, mushrooms. It's a ruse, she thinks. There will be meat later. A man killed in the street, in an alleyway, up in the mountains, or below them, somewhere deep under the earth in a cave.

It's a nice apartment. The windows carry a pure, clear light from outside, and the neighborhood is quiet enough that, even with the windows open, there's hardly any noise. There's a cat on the kitchen island, and Hanamura says, "Shoo" to it, and swats its butt with a magazine when that doesn't work. There's another cat watching her from the top of a bookshelf. Its eyes are yellow and its tail and ears are dipped in black.

A few minutes later, Hanamura brings her milk tea.

"I can't drink milk," she says.

"It's made with condensed milk," Hanamura says. "Go on! It's fine." When she doesn't take it, he says, "It's not poisoned, okay? Go on. Souji will be back soon."

She takes the tea, but it doesn't mean she likes him any better. "How soon?"

"I dunno. He's at work." He has coffee in the kitchen. She can hear the coffee maker at work. "So you're, what now? Eighteen? Twenty?"

Seventeen. She drinks her tea instead of answering. When Hanamura's coffee's done, he gets up and makes two cups. He looks around the apartment. From the looks of it, there's only one bedroom.

He comes back, blowing cool air over his coffee. She asks, "Do you still eat people?"

His face stiffens into an ugly, bitter anger. He puts the coffee down. "You're not making this easy."

Why should she make it easy for him? He was her kidnapper. An eye for an eye. That's justice for some. What kind of guy kidnaps a six-year-old girl? It didn't even matter in the end. The person they traded for, Tatsumi, died a day later. They found his and Satonaka's bones all chewed up on the roof of someone's house.

Hanamura pulls at his hair and says, "It's not like we wanted to. I wasn't even the one who decided to take you. That was all Yukiko-san. Your brother tried to keep you safe. He didn't know we took you into the TV. He was so mad at us when he found out. He really cared about you. Hey, are you listening to me?" He snaps his fingers in front of her face. "Hey! Is anyone in there?"

* * *

_DOJIMA-SAN DO NOT MOVE I AM COMING FOR YOU_

That was sent two hours ago. It's past noon now. She's still in Hanamura and her cousin's apartment, waiting. Hanamura is smoking cigarettes through an open window. He's changed into a striped tank top and bright red shorts. Every now and then he checks his phone.

She spent almost an hour hoping for Shirogane to come charging through the door, and has to remind herself to not be disappointed when it doesn't happen. As far as she knows, he never leaves when someone, anyone, can see him. She's the one who had to find him at the beginning of the summer, who did the legwork, who appointed herself to be his agent in his quiet to find her cousin; of course, he's the one who did the planning. But she did things, too.

Finally, as the sunsets, her cousin comes home. The door opens and both she and Hanamura look up. The man who steps in wears a suit and carries a briefcase. His hair is cut close to his head and dyed a flat, matte black. He's on his phone. Nanako stands up. Her cousin looks at her for a brief moment, then keeps talking on his phone. The cats come to the door and rub against his legs.

"Uh-huh," he's saying. "Right. Yes. Dinner next week. I'm looking forward to it, Emily-san. I'm being forward? Ah, well…" Hanamura draws a line across his throat, then points his thumb at Nanako. "Yeah, that sounds great. My phone's dying. Can I e-mail you to confirm details? Great. Goodbye." He hangs up and nods to Hanamura. They walk to the hall, speaking in low tones.

When they come out again, her cousin's taken off his jacket and hung it over his arm.

"Come with me," he says.

"Why?" she says. "Are you going to kill me, too?"

"I don't want Shirogane finding us."

"I've been here for hours. He's going to find you anyway."

"She's right, you know," Hanamura says.

Her cousin's face doesn't change. "Take her downstairs. I'm going to borrow Teshima-san's car."

"Sorry, kid," Hanamura says, not very apologetic. He takes her by the arm and walks her downstairs. "Wait. Give me your phone."

"Why?"

"You think I'm dumb enough to let Shirogane use your GPS?"

He takes her phone, knocks out the battery, and gives her back the empty shell. It's lighter now, unable to turn on. Blank and empty.

It's still bright outside. The only difference between the light from this morning and the light now is yellower, older, and less harsh. Tired is the word that comes to mind, and that's how she feels. Tired.

A bright yellow car pulls up. Her cousin rolls down the window and says, "Get in."

* * *

When she was six years old, she was very sick. She was sick for a long time. They didn't let her out of the hospital for months. There's a period of a year with nothing in her head, though the memories move like a slow octopus trapped between the skin of her head and the hard skull of her brain.

She remembered it eventually. Right on the tenth anniversary of the first murder, it came back, the whole thing: on the Internet, on TV, then at last into her head.

She has the photograph of him from when he was in high school, but nothing prepared her for seeing him again. The neatness of his appearance, the careful balance of severe and well-dressed and a little prissy. He has a bland face, but it has a handsome character on inspection. A visible second eyelid, drooping a little down. His mouth is small, but his lips are bright red. His teeth are very straight. On occasion he looks at her at the rearview mirror, unafraid to stare. Usually she's the one who looks away.

He takes her not up the mountain, but to an empty and lonely field, far enough that Tokyo grows small, then vanishes. They enter the suburbs, then pass out of them. He drives until they reach a patch of woods. It's three o'clock in the afternoon, but the light doesn't seem to enter through the trees. If she died in there, would anyone find her? Or worse: would there be anyone who could?

Hanamura and her cousin stand with their backs to the trees. She stands next to the car with her knee braced against the hood.

"How's your uncle?" her cousin says. When she doesn't say anything, he says, "How are you, then? Were you in the hospital for a long time?" When she says nothing again, he lowers his head and sighs. "Have you come to kill me, Nanako? Or are you afraid of me?" Her leg shakes. He smiles, a small but brilliant smile like her brother used to have. "You've grown to be a brave girl."

* * *

He coaxes it out of her by inches: how old she is, the town she's living in, how her father is doing, what grade she's in at school. What she's doing here. Why she had to find her. In exchange, he tells her in recent years it's become popular again for police departments to train medical examiners to do autopsies, and that's what he does: cuts into the dead all day to determine their causes of death. It's steady, good work.

"Oh, really?" she says, not understanding at first. A minute later she ends up throwing up behind a rock. He rubs her back with a soothing hand.

"Don't touch me!" she says.

"You'll feel better this way. Look. The color's returning to your face. Can you walk? Stand up."

"Stop it. Stop it!" She bends over, hand on her throat and the urge to retch rising, but nothing comes out. She ends up crying hot tears, her eyes burning and head pounding with an angry, pulsing heat. Her brother hands her a handkerchief. She presses it over her nose and eyes and tries to pressure her tears into stopping, but they keep spilling over and coming out. Her knees hit the ground, then her forehead. She cries over and over again until her face hurts.

"I want to go home," she moans, meaning to Inaba before he ever came into her life. "I want Mom." But that makes her think of her mother in the coffin with her hands clasped together and wooden beads wrapped around her fingers and wrists, then everything going into flames. Her sobs increase. She hears him stand up and walk away.

"Let me have a drag," he says to Hanamura.

"I'll give you it if you suck my cock later."

"My little sister's over there, you ass."

A second later, she hears a lighter click. When she looks up, her brother's leaning against the car, a cigarette in hand. It's a familiar sight and a familiar smell. She turns away and brushes the dirt from her face. She sniffs, loudly, then blows her nose into the handkerchief.

Her cousin waits until she rejoins them by the car. She holds her hand out to Hanamura and says, "I want one."

Hanamura reaches for his pack, but her cousin shakes his head and says, "No."

"Why not?" she says. "You're not my Dad. You aren't my real brother, either. If he wants to give me one, then he can give me one if he wants."

"No."

"You aren't being fair. You're not fair to anyone. I hate you!"

"You're underage. It'd be wrong." He takes a long drag, turns his head to the side, and blows rings.

"Show-off," Hanamura says.

"These things are death. This is your second pack this week. Stop buying so much. I'll make you wear those patches."

"Shut up. It's just been stressful lately." He opens the car door and throws the pack in anyway.

Her cousin blows more smoke rings, then says, "Nanako, do you believe in heaven?"

"Yes," she says.

"I don't." He exhales a cloud of sweet-smelling, acrid smoke.

"Don't be depressing," Hanamura says. "You don't know if there's one or not."

"I'm not saying there isn't one. But just because you hope for one to be there doesn't mean there is one. Look. I can believe somewhere out there is a billion yen in cash waiting for me, but that doesn't mean it'll ever be mine. Probably just means there's a fox pissing on it somewhere right now."

"Whatever," Hanamura says. He walks to the edge of the woods with his hands in his pockets.

Her brother reaches into the car and lights himself a new cigarette using the old one. "I remember you asked me that once. If I believed in heaven. You were worried about your mother. When I say I don't believe in heaven—I'm not saying I don't care about the people I killed. It's just… Nanako, do you believe in hell?"

She looks at him steady, at the burning white stick in his fingers.

"I don't know if there's 'hell,'" he says. "But I know there are demons."

"You're lying. I don't want to hear your excuses," she says.

He shrugs, like he knows what a liar he is. Then he says, "Even if you don't think of me as your brother anymore, you'll always be my little sister. I'm very happy you came to find me. Thank you. But I can't let you remember this."

She feels a freezing chill. She tries to run, but her brother grabs her by the wrist before she can make it more than a step. She opens her mouth to scream. He puts a calm hand over her mouth. She remembers seeing a dark shadow. She remembers seeing her brother's face split in two and turn into something else. Something with teeth. She screams.

* * *

When she wakes up, she's on asphalt. There's a twig in her hair. She sits up in a panic. She can't see anything and there's blood in her mouth. Her throat's raw from something. What happened? What's going on?

"Ssh," a woman says, and puts a hand on her shoulder. There's a moment of brief terror—_I can't see her hand_—before a woman wearing a black coat and a red scarf appears in her field of vision. They're in an alleyway of some kind. She can hear music thumping from some open door or window.

Nanako blinks and rubs at her eyes, then immediately checks her hands to make sure she still has all her fingers.

"Are you all right?" the woman says. "You were out for a while."

"What happened?" Nanako says, trying to stand. She remembers, in a blurry way, leaving Shirogane's apartment this morning. She—she was after something. She was after someone. Her… her cousin. But then…

The woman pushes her down. "I already called a taxi. You shouldn't drink so much. Are you underage?"

"I wasn't drinking!"

But the woman rubs her back and says, "You don't have to drink to impress people. Next time try ordering a soda and having a conversation. You'd be surprised at how much fun that is."

"What are you talking about?" Nanako says, but then a car's headlights blind her. The woman helps her up. Her hair tickles Nanako's cheek. As they come around onto the street, Nanako sees a rainbow flag hanging in a window. "I'm not—"

"You don't have to hide it," the woman says, and puts her in the taxi. "Could you take her to Yokohama? To this apartment… let me check my phone." She gives the driver the address to Shirogane's apartment. She puts a hand on Nanako's hand and says, "Don't come here again, Nanako-chan. Okay?"

"Okay," Nanako says. The woman looks familiar, but she doesn't remember why. It's only when the taxi starts moving that she realizes who the woman must be—she spins around, shouting, "You!"—but she's already gone.

* * *

The driver's the same one who took her to that electronic shop. After he drops her off at Shirogane's apartment, he gives her the number of the taxicab company, and drives away.

She's so hungry. She stumbles through the lobby and to the elevator. When she reaches for her key, she can't find them. She can't find her phone either. For a moment she's afraid she won't be able to enter the apartment, but the door swings open and a man pulls her into the apartment.

It's Shirogane. He's smaller than she thought—she's easily five or six centimeters taller than him. And he's scrawny. And, she thinks, really pretty, even when he's in shorts and a baggy t-shirt.

"Are you all right, Dojima-san?" he says, gripping her by the shoulders. He makes her sit down on the couch, then shakes her hard. "How dare you disobey my direct order. I nearly called your father."

"Stop it," she says. "_Stop,_" she says when he doesn't stop shaking her. She pushes him away, but her hand slips low on his chest. She ends up touching something soft. Shirogane freezes, then pulls away quickly. She blinks at her hand, then at Shirogane. For the first time, she notices he has breasts. "Shirogane-san?"

"I—because of a medical condition," he says, his face going red. "Give me a minute. I will—"

"Wait," she says, before he can run. "Wait—please. Don't leave me alone."

"It's not safe for us to be this close to one another."

"I'm not going to hurt you," she says.

"I mean that you are the one who is not safe. I have the same affliction as Seta." His face turns even redder, if possible. When she doesn't recoil or look sick, he says, "You may run away or scream at me, if you'd like."

Strange. She feels as though a few weeks ago she would have. Now she just feels pity. "I'm not scared of you."

"You're frightened by nothing," he says in a voice full of wonder. He brings a chair from the kitchen and sits close to her, knee-to-knee. He puts his fist against his mouth; he's missing his pinky. Then he says, "Dojima-san, do you believe in demons?"

He tells her everything he knows about the 'affliction.' It's like a virus, only there's no change in the DNA. A spiritual ailment. He sought help from a group of demon summoners and soul hackers: the summoners sealed the demon inside him, the soul hackers tried to sever the connection entirely, but it didn't work. Something in him was awakened. Now there was no hiding from it. But it's easier for him than it is for the others. He doesn't need much to keep the demon quiet. He has an arrangement with a friend who works in a hospital. One liver a week, or kidneys, or something.

Still, he says, the hunger is unbearable.

She listens, trying to understand, trying to work it out. All she can say in the end is, "Why?"

Shirogane shrugs. "Why," he says. "I have never been able to figure it out. I hoped finding Seta would answer these questions, but I feel as though even he doesn't know. Even if I find him, I may never know the truth."

"He'll make a mistake someday," she says. "And then—"

"And then what?" Shirogane says. He puts his hand on her forehead and says, "Nanako-san, it's been many years already. You're too young to have your life ruined by Seta. Leave it behind. Go home and forget about all of this."

"Could you forget it, Shirogane-san? If you saw the things I saw today—if you saw…" She trails off. That's strange. She can't remember anything between arriving at the electronic shop and waking up in the alleyway. She puts a hand on her stomach, to make sure there aren't any strange wounds or holes, but there's nothing but smooth skin. "They drugged me," she says slowly. "They drugged me because I was getting too close. Shirogane-san, I talked to them today—I _know_ I talked to them. Have you run Teshima's fingerprints?"

"Yes. They're clean."

"Then," she says, grasping, reaching. "Maybe—maybe one of them changed their fingerprints."

"Unlikely."

"Then—"

"Dojima-san," he says, his voice gentle. "Get some rest. If you want then we will conduct a more thorough investigation of Teshima-san in the morning."

"I do want it," she said, not saying: I want more, I want more than that. I want to tear him apart. I want to ruin them.

"Then we will tomorrow. Now be calm." He puts a hand on her hair and ruffles it. His touch is awkward and wildly variable, too light then too heavy, too fast then too slow. It must have been years since he's touched anyone, she thinks. She leans into his touch, imagining what qualities his loneliness must have had; the shadowed halls of his hunger. He continues stroking her hair until she says, quietly, "I'm hungry."

* * *

Later that night Yukiko calls. She's done as he asked, she says. When he asks her where she left Nanako, she gives him the name of a bar.

"That's a gay bar," Souji says. He's packed up a suitcase and is waiting for the taxi outside his apartment. Yosuke left ahead of him, since Rise lives all the way in Nagano. Yukiko is in Kawaguchi; two hours away, but still closer than Rise. They'll come back when they know whether Sandman did his job. With luck they won't even have to change their names again. It takes a lot of work faking those medical examiner licenses. He hopes Teshima won't mind taking care of the cats for the next few days.

They'll still have to do something about Shirogane, especially now that they know where he lives. But it'd be gauche to kill him outright, and Souji has a fond spot for him. He chews on his cheek absently, thinking.

On the phone, Yukiko says, "Oh, really? It was the first place that came to mind when I thought of Kawasaki."

"Yukiko-san, don't you know any other kinds of bars?"

"I don't drink often."

"A sports bar."

"I don't follow sports, either."

"Ah, well," he says. The taxi's here. "I'll talk to you at your apartment later."

"Yes. I'm sorry I don't have anything for you today."

"It was on short notice. Please don't worry." 'Stop killing people every time I come over. It's weird,' he wants to say. She values her independence too fiercely, wants to prove that she can have a life without bothering anyone else. Between her obvious complex and all her murders, it's no wonder she's never been able to keep a relationship going for more than eighteen months.

The taxi driver's a familiar looking guy, though he can't place why. The taxi driver meets his eye. He recognizes Souji, too. The driver grins, and says, "It's been a while, huh?"

"Sorry?"

"I'm joking, I'm joking. But it felt right, didn't it?" The driver pops open the trunk, gets out of the car, and helps him with his bags. "Where you going this late?"

"Just to the station."

It should be a fairly short ride, but there's a traffic jam five kilometers from the station. The driver tunes to the traffic report. Some kind of accident. A four car pile-up.

"Ah, amazing," the driver says with a shake of his head. He looks over his shoulder at Souji again. "Hey," he says. "Did you attend high school in Kobe by any chance?"

"No chance," Souji says with a laugh.

"You're a dead ringer for my ex-husband. Let me tell you a story about him. Only if you want to, though."

"I like listening to other people. Go ahead."

"Okay," the driver says, turning around even further. The car behind them honks. There's some space ahead. The driver inches forward. He begins to talk again, this time still facing ahead. "I married my childhood friend when I was fifteen, and got pregnant a few months later. —Ah, I'm a woman, in case you couldn't tell. Well, the pregnancy made me sick. It nearly killed me—no, I'm sure it killed me. My husband told me all through the pregnancy, 'Don't worry, don't worry, I'll still be there.' Then he saw me die on the table and ran away and never showed up again. Not even when I told him I was alive again."

"That's terrible."

"Yeah. The baby died, too."

"Hmm," he says. How awkward.

The cars surge forward. They're at the station fifteen minutes later. She helps him take his bags out of the trunk, and waits patiently while he counts out the cash. When he hands it over, the taxi driver clasps their hands together and holds it tight. Her eyes are bright red, her mouth a pale pink. She whispers into his ear, "You don't recognize me, do you? You don't remember our vows, either. One thousand deaths and one thousand five hundred births. Well, look at us now. I may be dead, but I'm no monster. I thought I could make you suffer; but you don't even know you're in pain."

She lets go. His hand feels warm, but when he curls his hand into a fist, it's stiff and difficult to move. She watches him, expectant, but he can't see what she wants from him. What does anyone say to that cryptic bullshit? He chooses to smile. "I told you. I'm not your husband."

"My mistake. You going to tip me?"

He adds an extra five hundred yen but thinks, Next time I'll just take the bus.

He gets a window seat and settles in for a long ride. He examines his hand. It seems the same to him, yet something in him has changed. For a moment he feels an electric hope in his heart and touches the back of his neck. Surely the atma is gone. Surely now the demon has left. He feels the skin, hoping, hoping, desperately hoping.

He sees his face go pale in the window. Look at him. He's in shambles. He smooths his hair back, pops his collar, and leans back in the seat. That taxi driver is still troubling him. Souji bites his lip in thought. He bites too hard and blood comes spilling into his mouth. He takes a handkerchief from his pocket and presses it against his lip. It's the same one Nanako used to dry her tears earlier, but he doesn't have anything else. Her smell moves him to a strange, echoing sorrow.

"Izanami and Izanagi," he says out loud. So that's why it sounded so familiar. What a pretentious woman she was, trying to pass that hogwash as her life's story! Why, then, is he moved to tears?


End file.
